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FREEMAN'S HISTORICAL COURSE FOR SCHOOLS. 

HISTORY 

OF 

SCOTLAND 



BY 

MARGARET MACARTHUR. 

EDITED BY 

Edward A. Freeman, D.C.L. 
Edition Adapted for American Students, 




NEW YORK 
HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 

1874 



J 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the Year 1874, by 

HENRY HOLT, 

In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 






CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER I. 

TAGB 

THE GAELIC PERIOD I 

CHAPTER II. 

THE ENGLISH PEKIOD. 19 

CHAPTER III. 

THE STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE 35 

CHAPTER IV. 

THE INDEPENDENT KINGDOM 52 

CHAPTER V. 

THE JAMESES • • • • 67 



n CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER VI. 

*AGB 

THE REFORMATION 96 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE UNION OF THE CROWNS . . 1 25 

CHAPTER VIII. 

AFTER THE UNION „•.•••.....,.. 167 



CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 



The Gaelic Period. 

a.d. 

Agricola's Invasion • 80 

Severus' Invasion 208 

Founding of Northumberland by Ida 547 

Founding of Dalriada by the Scots about 503 

Union of Picts and Scots 843 

Commendation to Eadward 924 

Battle of Brunanburh 937 

Battle of Carham 1018 

Cnut's Invasion 1031 

Malcolm Canmore King 1057 

William's Invasion 1073 

Malcolm slain 1093 

The English Period, 1097—1286. 

Eadgar JQ97 

Alexander 1 1107 

David 1124 

Battle of the Standard 1138 

Malcolm IV 1153 

William the Lion 1165 



CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 



A.D. 

Capture at Alnwick 1174 

Treaty of Falaise 1174 

Council of Northampton 1176 

Treaty with Richard 1 1189 

Alexander II 1214 

Border-line fixed 1222 

Council at York 1237 

Alexander III 1249 

Battle of Largs 1263 

Man and the Sudereys annexed 1266 

Death of Alexander III 1286 

The Struggle for Independence, to 1314. 

Queen Margaret 1286 

Treaty of Brigham 1290 

Margaret dies 1290 

Council meets at Norham, 3rd June 1291 

Judgment given at Berwick, nth November 1292 

John crowned King 1292 

Edward's first Conquest 1296 

Rising of Wallace 1297 

Surrender at Irvine 1297 

Battle of Stirling, nth September 1297 

Battle of Falkirk 1298 

Edward's second Conquest 1303 

Capture of Wallace 1305 

Robert Bruce crowned King, 27th March 1306 

Death of Edward 1307 

Battle of Bannockburn, 24th June 1314 



CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 



The Independent Kingdom, 1314—1424. 

a.d. 

Parliament at Cambuskenneth 1326 

Peace of Northampton 1328 

David II 1329 

Edward Balliol's Invasion 1332 

Battle of Halidon Hill 1333 

Capture of David 1346 

His release 1347 

Invasion of Edward III 1356 

Robert II 1370 

Raid of Otterburn 1388 

Robert III 1390 

Fight on North Inch 1396 

Invasion of Henry IV 1400 

Battle of Homildon Hill 1402 

Capture of the Earl of Carrick 1405 

Robert III. dies 1406 

Burning of Reseby 1408 

St. Andrews University founded 1408 

Battle of Harlaw, 24th July 1411 

Albany the Regent dies 1419 

The Jameses, 1424—1557. 

James I. crowned King 1424 

Parliament at Inverness 1427 

Murder of the King 1436 

James II 1436 

Murder of the Douglases 1439 

Murder of William, Earl of Douglas 1452 



CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 



a.d. 

Battle of Arkinholm 1454 

The King slain at Roxburgh 1460 

James III 1460 

Orkney and Shetland annexed 1469 

St. Andrews raised to an Archbishopric 1471 

Revolt of Lauder Bridge 1482 

Battle of Sauchieburn 1488 

James IV 1488 

Marriage of James to Margaret Tudor 1502 

Lordship of the Isles broken up 1504 

Battle of Flodden, 9th September 1513 

James V 1513 

"Erection" of the King 1524 

Fall of Angus 1528 

Rout at Solway Moss 1542 

Mary 1542 

Hertford's first Invasion 1544 

Hertford's second Invasion 1545 

Burning of George Wishart 1545 

Murder of Beaton 1545 

Battle of Pinkie . . , 1547 

Mary sails for France 1548 

First marriage of Mary, 24th April 1558 

The Reformation Period, 1557 — 1603. 

The " First Covenant " signed . 1557 

Burning of Walter Mill 1558 

Religious riots 1559 

Treaty of Berwick « 1560 



CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 



A.D. 

Reformation Statutes passed 1560 

Return of the Queen 1561 

Battle of Corrichie 1562 

Second marriage of Mary, 29th July 1565 

Murder of Rizzio 1566 

Murder of Darnley, 9th February .1567 

Third Marriage of Mary, 15th May 1567 

Surrender at Carberry, 15th June 1567 

Abdication of Mary 1567 

James VI. crowned 1567 

Battle of Langside, 13th May 1568 

Conference at York begins, October 1568 

Murder of Murray the Regent 1570 

Taking of Dunbarton, 2nd April 1571 

Parliament at Stirling, 4th September 1571 

Lennox -the Regent slain 1571 

Episcopacy revived 1572 

Death of John Knox, 24th November 1572 

Death of Mar the Regent, 24th November 1572 

Surrender of Edinburgh Castle 1573 

The King rules alone, '4th March 1578 

Raid of Ruthven 1581 

Death of Mary Stuart, 8th February 1587 

Marriage of the King 1590 

Abolition of Episcopacy 1592 

The Gowrie Plot, 5th August 1600 

James becomes King of England • 1603 



CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 



The Union of the Crowns, 1603—1707. 

A.D. 

Fight in Glen Fruin 1604 

Restoration of Episcopacy 1606 

Visit of the King 1616 

Articles of Perth passed 1618 

Nova Scotia founded 1621 

King James dies 1625 

Charles 1 1625 

Charles crowned in Scotland 1633 

Liturgy Riots 1637 

The Covenant renewed 1638 

Assembly at Glasgow 1638 

Episcopacy abolished 1638 

" Trot of Turriff," May 1639 

Pacification of Berwick, June 1639 

Invasion of England by the Scots 1640 

Treaty of Ripon, begun 1st October 1640 

„ „ ,, ended 7th August 1641 

Battle of Tippermuir, September 1644 

Charles comes to the Scots Camp, 5th May 1645 

Battle of Philiphaugh, September 1645 

The Scots give up Charles, 8th January 1647 

The Surrender at Uttoxeter, 25th August 1648 

" Whiggamore's Raid " 1648 

Charles I. beheaded, 30th January 1649 

Charles II. proclaimed 1649 

Rising and beheading of Montrose 1650 

Charles II. arrives in Scotland 1650 

Battle of Dunbar, 3rd September ......... 1650 



CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 



A.D. 

Battle of Worcester, 3rd September 1651 

Legislative Union with England 1654 

Restoration of Charles II 1660 

Act "Rescissory" passed 1661 

Episcopacy re-established 1661 

The " Ejection " 1662 

The Westland Rising 1666 

The Indulgence, June 1669 

Murder of Sharp, May 1679 

Fight at Drumclog, May 1679 

Fight at Bothwell Bridge, June 1679 

Sanquhar Declaration, June 1680 

Test Act passed 1681 

James VII 1685 

Argyle's Rising 1685 

Full Indulgence 1688 

James VII. deposed 1688 

William and Mary proclaimed 1689 

Battle of Killiecrankie, 27th July 1689 

Episcopacy abolished 1690 

Massacre of Glencoe, 13th February 1691 

Charter granted to the Darien Company 1695 

Education Act passed 1696 

Anne 1701 

The Union of the Parliaments 1707 

After the Union. 

George 1 1714 

Jacobite Rising • 1715 



CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE. 



A.D. 

Malt-tax Riots 1724 

Porteous Riot 1736 

Jacobite Rising 1745 

Battle of Preston-pans, 20th September \ 1745 

Battle of Culloden, i6th April 1746 

Highland Society founded 1784 

First Steamboat tried 1788 

Penal laws against Romanists repealed 1793 

Colliers and Salters freed 1799 

Reform Bill passed 1832 

The Disruption ..«••••••••••• 1843 



HISTORY OF SCOTLAND. 



CHAPTER I. 
THE GAELIC PERIOD. 

The country {i)—the people (2) — Roman occupation (3) — English 
invasion (4)— the Scots {^—introduction of Christianity {6)— con- 
version of the Picts (7) — convei-sion of the English (8) — English 
conquests (9) — union of Picts and Scots (10) — the A T orthmen (n) 
— the Commendation (12) — annexation of Strathclyde (13) — 
acquisition of Lothian (14)— Cnufs invasion (15) — Macbeth (16) 
— English immigration (17) — William's invasion ( 1 8) — Margaret's 
reforms (19) — disputed succession (20)— Gaelic period ends (21) — 
summary (22). 

I. The Country.— The northern part of Great Britain is 
now called Scotland, but it was not called so till the Scots, a 
Celtic people, came over from Ireland and gave their name to 
it. The Romans who first mention it in history speak of it 
as Caledonia. There are two points in which the history of 
this country and of the people who live in it is unlike the 
history of most of the other countries and nations of Europe. 
Firstly, it never was taken into the great Roman Empire; 
and secondly in it we find a Celtic people who, instead of 
disappearing before the Teutons, held their ground against 
them so well that in the end the Teutons were called by 
the name of the Celtic people, were ruled by the Celtic kings 

M B 



2 THE GAELIC PERIOD. [chap. 

and fought for the independence of the Celtic kingdom as 
fiercely as if they had themselves been of the Celtic race. 
But the whole of the country is not of the same nature. The 
northern part is so nearly cut off from the rest of Britain by 
the two great Firths of Forth and Clyde as to form almost a 
separate island, and this peninsula is again divided into High- 
lands and Lowlands. Speaking roughly, we may say that 
all the west is Highland and the east Lowland. A range 
of mountains sweeping in a semicircle from the Firth of 
Clyde to the mouth of the Dee, known as Drumalbyn or the 
Mount, may be taken as the line of separation, though the 
Lowlands extend still further north along the eastern coast. 
The marked differences between these two districts have 
had a very decided influence on the character of the inhabi- 
tants, and consequently on the national development. The 
Lowlands are well watered and fertile, and the people who 
lived there were peaceable and industrious, and both on the 
seaboard and inland there is early notice of the existence of 
populous and thriving towns. The Highlands, on the con- 
trary, are made up of lakes, moors, and barren hills, whose 
rocky summits are well-nigh inaccessible, and whose heath- 
clad sides are of little use even as pasture. Even in the 
glens between the mountains, where alone any arable land 
is to be found, the crops are poor, the harvest late and un- 
certain, and vegetation of any kind very scanty. The 
western coast is cut up into numberless islets, and the 
coast-line is constantly broken by steep jagged promontories 
jutting out seaward, or cut by long lochs, up which the sea 
runs far into the land between hills rising almost as bare and 
straight as walls on either side. In the Highlands even in 
the present day there are no towns of any importance, for 
the difficulty of access by land and the dangers of the 
coast have made commerce well-nigh impossible. The 
Highlanders, who were discouraged by the barrenness of 



I.] THE PEOPLE. 3 

their native mountains, where even untiring industry could 
only secure a bare maintenance, and tempted by the sight of 
prosperity so near them, found it a lighter task to lift the 
crops and cattle of their neighbour than to rear their own ? 
and have at all times been much given to pillaging the more 
fortunate Lowlanders, of whom they were the justly dreaded 
scourge. 

2. The People. — As the country is thus naturally divided 
into two parts distinctly opposite in character, so the people 
are made up of two distinct branches of the great Aryan 
family, the Celtic and the Teutonic. The Celts were the first 
comers, and were in possession when the country became 
historically known ; that is, at the first invasion of the 
Romans. In later times we find three Celtic peoples in 
North Britain ; to wit, the Picts, the Scots, and the Welsh. 
The Picts were those Celts who dwelt north of the Firths in 
A Ida or Alban, as the earliest traditions call it ; and if we 
judge from the names of places and contemporary accounts and 
notices, there is every reason to believe that they were more 
akin to the Gaelic than to the British branch of the Celtic 
race. The Scots, the other Gaelic people, were, when we first 
hear of them, settled in Ireland, from whence at different 
times bands of them came over to the western coast of 
Britain. They were friends and allies of the Picts, and are 
early mentioned as fighting on their side against the Romans. 
After a time, when many more Scots had settled in Alba, 
their name became common to all the Celts north of the 
Firths, and from them the whole country was called Scot- 
land. The Celts south of the Firths were partly Chris- 
tianized and civilized by the Romans, and thus became very 
different from the rest. They got their name of Welsh from 
the Teutonic tribes who came from the land between the 
Elbe and the Eyder, and, settling along the eastern coast, 
finally took possession of a great tract of country, and called 

B 2 



4 THE GAELIC PERIOD. [chap. 

the Celts whom they displaced Welshmen or foreigners. The 
Celts called all these new comers Saxons, though this was 
really only the name of one of the first tribes that came 
over ; and as they gradually spread over the Lowlands, the 
word Saxon came to mean simply Low lander. In course of 
time the original proportions of these two races have been 
nearly reversed, so that the modern Scottish nation, though 
it keeps its Celtic name, instead of being made up of three 
Celts to one Saxon, is much more nearly three Saxons to 
one Celt. 

3. Roman Occupation. — The Romans, who had already 
made themselves masters of South Britain, were led into 
the northern part of the island by Julius Agricola, A.D. 80. 
But the Celts whom they found there, and whom they called 
Caledonians, were so well able to defend themselves among 
their mountains that the Romans, though they defeated therrf 
in a great battle on the Highland border, gave up the idea of 
conquering the country, and retreated again south of the 
Firths of Forth and Clyde. Across the isthmus between 
the two, which is about thirty miles wide, they built a line 
of forts, joined by a rampart of earth. This rampart was 
intended to serve as a defence to their colonists, and as a 
boundary to mark the limit of their empire ; though, as many 
Roman remains have been found north of the isthmus, they 
must have had settlements without as well as within the forti- 
fications. But the Caledonians, who were too high-spirited 
to look on quietly and see their country thus taken posses- 
sion of, harassed the colonists by getting over the wall and 
seizing or destroying everything they could lay their hands 
on. At length (A.D. 120) the Roman Emperor Hadrian built 
a second rampart across the lower isthmus, between the 
rivers Tyne and Sohuay, leaving the district between the two 
pretty much at the mercy of the fierce Picts, as the Romans 
now began to call the Caledonians. Twenty years later, in 



I.] ROMAN OCCUPATION. 5 

the reign of the Emperor Antoninus Pius, one of his generals, 
Lollius Urbicus, again drove them, back beyond the first 
wall, and repaired and strengthened the defences of Agri- 
cola. But, before half a century had passed, the Picts again 
burst the barrier, and killed the Roman commander. In 
208 the Emperor Severus cut his way through Caledonia 
with a large army. He reached the northern coast, but had 
no chance of fighting a battle, and lost many of his men. 
He repaired and strengthened the rampart of Hadrian. In 
time the Picts got over the second rampart too, and came 
south as far as Kent, where, in the latter part of the 
fourth century, Theodosius the Roman general, father of the 
famous Emperor of the same name, had to fight his way 
to London through their plundering hordes. Theodosius 
drove them back with great vigour, restored the Empire 
to its former boundary, and made the district between the 
walls into a Roman province, which he called Valentia, in 
honour of Valentinian, who was then Emperor. It was pro- 
bably about this time that the great stone wall was built 
across the lower isthmus. The dangers which threatened the 
capital of the Empire in the beginning of the next century 
forced the Romans to forsake this as well as all their other 
provinces in Britain, and the withdrawal of their troops 
left the Romanized Britons of Valentia a helpless prey to 
their merciless enemies the Picts. At the end of the three 
centuries of Roman occupation, the Britons south of the 
Firths had so little in common with the wild Picts, who 
in Alba and in Galloway still maintained their indepen- 
dence, that they were like people of a different race. The 
one set, though still savage and heathen, were as brave 
and fierce as ever ; the other, though Christianized and civi- 
lized, were so degenerated from the vigour of the original 
stock that they were powerless to resist their more warlike 
kinsmen. 



6 THE GAELIC PERIOD. [chap. 

4. English Invasion. — In the sixth century the Angles 
came in great force and settled on the eastern coast of 
Valentia, and drove the Britons, or as they called them 
Welshmen, back to the Westland Hills. This district then 
between the Roman walls was thus divided between two king- 
doms. The English kingdom of Northumberland, founded 
by Ida in 547, took in all the eastern part of the country 
south of the Fo?'th; while the Welsh kingdom, called 
Strathclyde from the river that watered it, stretched from 
the Firth of Clyde southwards towards the Dee. 

5. The Scots. — About the same time that the English were 
pouring in on the east, the Scots were settling all along 
the western coast. As the strait which separates Britain 
from Ireland is only twelve miles broad, the Scots could 
easily come over from Scotia, as Ireland was formerly ♦ 
called, to seek their fortune in the larger island. It is im- 
possible to fix the date of their first coming, but it was not 
till the beginning of the sixth century that there came over 

a swarm numerous and united enough to found a separate 
state. This is one of the few Celtic migrations on record 
from west to east, and forms an exception to the general 
displacement that was going on, by which the Celts were 
being driven further and further west before the Teutons. 
The leaders of the Scots were Fergus Mac Ere, and Lorn, 
of the family of the Dalriads, the ruling dynasty in the 
north of Ireland, and from them this new state founded on 
the western coast of what is now called Argyle got the 
name of Dalriada. 

6. Introduction of Christianity. — These Scots were not 
pagans like the Picts of Alba, for Ireland had already been 
Christianized. The new comers brought the new faith to 
their adopted country, and through them it spread among the 
Picts, and also among the English of Northumberland. The 
great apostle of the Scots was Columba. He was Abbot of 



I.] CONVERSION OF THE PICTS. 7 

Durrow in Ireland, but was obliged to leave his own country, 
because he had been engaged in a feud with some of his 
kinsfolk, in which his side was worsted. He came over to 
the new colony on the coast of Alba, and Coital, who was 
then King of the Dalriads, welcomed him, and gave him /, 
or Iona, an islet about a mile and a half long and a mile 
broad, lying west of the large island of Mull. Here Columba 
settled with the twelve monks who had come with him, 
and here they built for the service of God a little wooden 
church after their simple fashion, and for their own dwell- 
ing a few rude huts of wattle, which in after-times was 
called a monastery, where they passed their days in 
prayer and study. But their missionary zeal was as great 
as their piety, and from their head-quarters on Iona they 
went cruising about among the adjacent islands, extending 
their circuit to the Orkneys, and even, it is said, as far as 
Iceland. 

7. Conversion of the Picts. — Columba himself undertook 
the conversion of the Picts. About two years after his 
arrival at Ionajie set out on this important mission, crossed 
Drumalbyn, sought the court of Brud, the Pictish king, 
converted him, and founded religious communities on the 
same plan as that on Iona, on lands granted to him by 
the king or his dependent chiefs. The Church thus set up 
was perfectly independent of the Bishop of Rome or of any 
other See, but it inherited all the peculiarities of the Church 
of the Irish Scots. The monks had a way of their own of 
reckoning the time for keeping Easter and of shaving their 
heads, trifles which were considered important enough to 
become the subject of a very long quarrel, and it was not 
till 716 that they agreed to yield to the Roman custom 
in both matters. According to their system of Church 
government, the abbots of the monasteries were the chief 
dignitaries, and had all the power which in the rest of 



8 THE GAELIC PERIOD. [chap. 

Christendom was held to belong to bishops, while the 
bishops were held of no account except for ordaining 
priests, for which purpose there was one at least attached 
to each monastery. Columba, who was himself of the 
royal race, had so much influence among the Dalriads that 
his authority was called in to settle a dispute about the 
succession to the throne. The abbots of Iona after him 
continued supreme in all the ecclesiastical affairs of Alba 
till the middle of the ninth century, while the well-earned 
reputation for piety and learning enjoyed by the monks of 
his foundation was widely spread in continental Europe. 
About this time Kentigem revived among the Welshmen of 
Strathclyde the dying Christianity which had been planted 
there in the time of the Roman occupation. 

8. Conversion of the English. — The English of North- 
humberland were still heathens, and, as they were ever 
fighting with and growing greater at the expense of theif 
neighbours, their state bade fair to become the most powerful 
in Britain. In the beginning of the seventh century their 
king Eadwine was supreme over all Britain south of the 
Forth. But though Eadwine was converted by the preach- 
ing of Paullinus, the first Bishop of York, the new doctrine 
does not seem to have spread much among his people ; 
for one of his successors, Oswald, who in his youth had 
been an exile at the court of his kinsman the Pictish king, 
prayed the monks of Iona to send him one of their number 
to help to make his people Christian. Conau, the first 
missionary who went, was so much disgusted with the 
manners of the English that he very soon came back to his 
brethren. Then Aidan, another of their number, devoted 
his life to the task which Conan had found so distasteful. 
He taught and toiled among them with a zeal that was 
seconded by Oswald, the king, who himself acted as inter- 
preter, making the sermons of the monk intelligible to his 



I.] UNION OF PICTS AND SCOTS. g 

English hearers. From Lindisfarne, where the little church 
of Aidan was founded, like that of Iona, on an islet, Chris- 
tianity spread to the neighbouring state of Mercia^ and 
many monasteries and schools were founded after the 
Columban model. 

9. English Conquests. — Oswald and his successor Oswiu 
extended their dominions beyond the Firths, and it is said 
that they made the Scots and Picts pay tribute to them. 
The next king, Ecgfrith, marched north and crossed the 
Tay with a mighty host, but he was routed and slain in a 
great battle at a place called Nectansmere, the exact position 
of which is uncertain. From that time the English seem 
to have kept more to the country south of the Forth, and 
the Picts were more independent of them. This is about 
the only event of moment that we know of in the history 
of that people, of whom no records remain, except a long 
list of their kings down to 843, at which date they became 
united with the Scots under one king. 

10. Union of Picts and Scots. — This union took place 
under Kenneth MacAlpin, who was king of the Scots. That 
he was king of the Picts also is certain : how he came to be 
so can only be guessed: It is more probable that it was by 
inheritance than by conquest, though he and the kings after 
him kept his original title of King of Scots. Over how much 
land he reigned, and what degree of power he had over his 
subjects, is not known. It is thought that among the Celts 
the king was only the head of the dominant tribe among many 
other tribes or clans, each of which was bound to follow its 
own chief, and the king's control over those chiefs seems to 
have been more in name than in fact. The northern districts 
seem to have been ruled by powerful chiefs called Meters or 
Mormaers. These chiefs, who it has been supposed were 
nominally subject to the King of Scots, acted as if they were 
quite independent of him. They were indeed his most 



io THE GAELIC PERIOD. [chap. 

troublesome enemies, and several of the kings lost their 
lives in battle against them. Moray was the greatest of the 
Mormaerships. It lay north of the Spey and of the moun- 
tains of Argyle, and stretched across the country from the 
Moray Firth to the opposite ocean. 

II. Coming of the Northmen. — Kenneth was followed in 
turn by Donald, his brother, and Co?istantme, his son. 
Their reigns were mainly taken up in fighting with the 
Northmen, a. heathen people of Teutonic race, who infested 
the seas and plundered the seaboard. From the eighth 
century downwards they were the scourge alike of English 
and Celtic Britain, swooping down on the coasts, harrying 
the lands, and making off with their booty ; or, at other 
times, seizing and settling on great tracts of country. Three 
countries of modern Europe — Denmark, Norway, and 
Sweden were peopled by the Northmen. But while it was 
those from Denmark who chiefly harassed and finally con- 
quered the English, the Norwegians seem to have looked 
upon Scotland as their own especial prey, attracted doubt- 
less by the likeness between its many isles and inlets and 
the jagged outline of the larger Scandinavian peninsula. 
The long narrow lochs of the western coast, like the fiords of 
Norway, proved convenient harbours for the ships of these 
pirates. It is towards the close of the eighth century that 
we first hear of the descents of the Northmen on the 
Pictish kingdom. It is told how they ravaged all the coast, 
destroyed the Pictish capital, and haunted the Irish Sea. 
Their fury was specially directed against churches and 
religious communities, and Iona did not escape. Again 
and again it was wasted by fire and sword, its churches 
plundered, the brethren slain, till at length the abbot was 
compelled to seek on the mainland a refuge for himself 
and the relics of the saintly founder. Under Kenneth 
MacAlpin the supremacy over the Scottish Church was 



I.] THE COMMENDATION. n 

transferred to the monastery of Dunkeld. Under Kenneth's 
son, Constantine I., a fresh spirit was given to these in- 
vasions by the formation of the kingdom of Norway by 
Harold Harfagra. The petty chiefs displaced by him, 
who were called Vikings or dwellers on the bays, sought a 
settlement elsewhere. Several of them founded settlements 
in Ireland, whence they went to plunder the western shores 
of Britain. Others took up their quarters in the Orkneys. 
and the Sitdereys or Southern Isles, as the Northmen called 
those isles that are now known as the Hebrides. Those in the 
Orkneys were subdued by Harold, who made the islands into 
an Earldom and gave it to Sigurd, one of his allies. Thor- 
stein, Sigurd's successor, proved a formidable foe to the King 
of Scots, made himself master of all the north country, 
pretty nearly answering to the modern counties of Caithness 
and Sutherland, to which last the Northmen gave its name 
because it lay south of their island possessions. On Thor- 
stein's death his great earldom fell to pieces. About this 
time one Cyric or Grig, who is supposed to have been one of 
the Northern chiefs, seized on the throne and reigned about 
eighteen years, leaving his name on record as the liberator 
of the Scottish Church. 

12. The Commendation.— Constantine II. (900-943), grand- 
son of Kenneth, who came after Grig, commended himself 
and his kingdom to Eadward, king of the English, in 924. 
Constantine chose him as "father and lord/' that is, he placed 
himself under his protection, and acknowledged Eadward 
as mightier than himself. On this compact were based 
the subsequent claims of the English to the overlordship 
of the Scots. This commendation was renewed to JEthelstan, 
Eadward's successor. But Constantine soon repented of his 
submission, and a few years later he and the Welshmen of 
Strathclyde joined the Danes in their attempt to get back 
Northumberland, from which ^Ethelstan had expelled them. 



12 THE GAELIC PERIOD. [CHAP. 

The allies were utterly routed in the great battle of Brunan~ 
birrh, in which Constantine's son was slain, in 937. Six years 
later Constantine exchanged civil for spiritual rule, and retired 
as abbot to the Monaste?y of St. Andrews. 

13. Annexation of Strathclyde. — Malcolm I. (943-954) 
succeeded Constantine, though not his son, but his kinsman, 
for the Scots did not adhere strictly to the order of succes- 
sion which is now customary : though they kept to the royal 
family, they generally preferred the brother to the son of the 
last king. The great event of this reign was the annexation 
of Stj'athclyde, which had been conquered by the English 
king Eadmund, and was now granted by him to Malcolm 
as a territorial fief, held on condition of doing military ser- 
vice by land and sea whenever it should be required. Thus 
Strathclyde became an appanage of the heir apparent to the 
Scottish crown. Of the six kings after Malcolm, Induff, 
Duff, Colin, Kenneth II., Constantine III., and Kenneth III., 
little is known. They passed their lives and met their deaths 
in struggles with the Welsh or with their own northern sub- 
jects. Under Induff the Scots got Edinburgh, which had 
been founded by Eadwine of Northumberland. 

14. Acquisition of Lothian.— Malcolm II., grandson of 
the first of the name, was the last of the direct line of 
Kenneth MacAlpin. His reign, which lasted thirty years, is 
notable from the fact that he managed to get hold of Lothian, 
the northern part of Northumberland. One of Malcolm's 
first acts was an invasion of this earldom. Waltheof, the 
earl, being old and feeble, shut himself up in his castle of 
Bamborough and let Malcolm advance unresisted. He got 
as far as Durham, but there he was met and defeated by 
Uhtred, the vigorous son of the old Earl. Some ) ears later, 
when his old enemy Uhtred was dead, Malcolm made a 
second invasion, and took ample revenge for his defeat at 
Durham in the brilliant victory at Carham, on the banks of 



I.] CNUT'S INVASION. n 

the Tweed, in 1018. After this victory the Scots were in 
possession of Lothian, which Eadulf Cutel, now Earl of 
Northumberland, was not strong enough to take from them. 
It has been said that Lothian had been already granted by 
Eadgar of England to Kenneth III., who petitioned for it on 
plea of ancient hereditary right. If so, the Scots must have 
lost it again ; but after the victory of Carham they had it and 
kept it, though their king held it as an English earldom, and 
did homage for it to the king of the English. 

15. Cnut's Invasion. — In 103 1 Cnut, the mighty Dane 
who reigned oyer Denmark, Norway, and England, came 
north, and Malcolm met him, acknowledged him as his over- 
lord, and renewed the agreement which had been made 
between Constantine and Eadward. Three years after his 
submission to Cnut, Malcolm died, leaving as his heir 
Duncan, the son of one of his daughters who had married 
Crinan, Abbot of Dunkeld. There is a tradition that, to 
secure Duncan's succession, Malcolm had caused the grand- 
son of Kenneth III. to be murdered. If he did so, this crime 
defeated its own end, for Grttach, sister of the murdered man, 
was now the wife of Macbeth, the Mormaer of Moray, one 
of the most powerful chiefs. Duncan came north to make 
war on some of these turbulent Maers, and Macbeth seized 
the opportunity thus offered by the presence of the king 
in his province, attacked and defeated him in battle, and 
afterwards slew him in a place called Bothgowan, which it 
is thought means a smith's hut. 

16. Macbeth, 1040- 1057. — Macbeth must not be looked on 
as an usurper and murderer. He was the natural supporter 
of the claims of his wife and Lulach, her son by a former 
marriage, who, according to the received rule of Gaelic suc- 
cession, had a better right to the throne than Duncan him- 
self; and no doubt he justified the murder of the young king 
as lawful revenge for that of his wife's brother. At all events, 



14 THE GAELIC PERIOD. [chap. 

after he had got the kingdom, he ruled it well and wisely, so 
that his reign was a time of great national plenty and 
prosperity, and he and his wife were benefactors of the 
Church and of the poor, not only at home, but abroad, for 
it stands on record that they sent alms to the poor at Rome. 
But he was not left long in peaceable possession, for the 
father of Duncan, Crinan, Abbot of Dunkeld, got up a rising 
in favour of his two grandsons, Malcolm and Donald. About 
the same time Siward, Earl of Northumberland, brought an 
army against Macbeth, and drove him from the throne, 
though he got it back as soon as Si ward went away. Some 
years later Siward, whose kinswoman Duncan had married, 
again took up the cause of his cousin Malcolm, invaded 
the kingdom and defeated the king in a great battle ; and 
though Macbeth held out for four years longer, he was at 
last slain, at Lumphanan in Aberdeen. Lulack, son of 
Gruach, died soon after ; and though he left a son, called 
Malsnecte, whose claim was brought up again long after- 
wards, there was no attempt made at that time to prolong 
the struggle. 

17. English Immigration. Malcolm III., 1057-1093. — 
The reign of this Malcolm, surnamed Canmore or the great 
head, is a turning-point in Scottish history, which henceforth 
ceases to be essentially Scottish; the Celtic manners, lan- 
guage, laws, and customs being changed by the strong 
English influence brought to bear on them in this and the 
following reigns. This change was in great measure due 
to the conquest of England in 1066 by the Normans under 
William the Conqueror. The Scottish court was the nearest 
and most natural refuge for those Englishmen who would 
not yield to the strangers. Thither they flocked in great 
numbers, and there they found a hearty welcome. Among 
these exiles came Eadgar the sEtheling, the representative 
of the West-Saxon kings, and with him his mother and his 



I.] WILLIAM'S INVASION. 15 

two sisters Margaret and Christina. Malcolm received them 
very kindly, and they stayed with him all the winter. In 
the beginning of his reign Malcolm had invaded England, 
where Edward the Confessor was then king, and had wasted 
the shires of York and Northumberland, while Tostig the 
earl was gone on a pilgrimage to Rome. He now made a 
second raid of the same sort, although, when William held 
his court at York two years before, he had sent in his nominal 
homage to him by the Bishop of Durham. This time he 
went on behalf of the ./Etheling, and harried the districts 
of Cleveland and Durham, which had already been wasted 
by William. His progress was marked by every species of 
cruelty, neither churches nor children were spared, and the 
Scots brought back so many captives that English slaves 
were to be found even in the very poorest households. Mean- 
while Eadgar, who had taken part in two or three risings 
in England, again sought the protection of the Scottish court, 
and shortly after Malcolm succeeded in persuading Margaret 
to become his wife. He had before this been married to 
Ingebiorg, widow of Earl Thorfin of Orkney, and had one 
son, Duncan. 

18. William's Invasion. — In 1072 William came north 
with a fleet and an army to avenge Malcolm's raid. He 
went as far as Abernethy on the Tay, the former Pictish 
capital, and there Malcolm met him and acknowledged 
William as overlord, by becoming his man or vassal, giving 
hostages, among whom was his own son Duncan, as warrants 
for his good faith. But some years later Malcolm took 
advantage of William's absence in Normandy to harry his 
kingdom again as far as the Tyne, bringing back both spoil 
and captives. The Conqueror's eldest son, Robert, came 
north to avenge this invasion, but happily he and Malcolm 
came to terms without any more bloodshed. This peace was 
not broken till 1092, when Malcolm again invaded England. 



1 6 THE GAELIC PERIOD. [chap. 

The excuse for this was that his brother-in-law, the /Etheling, 
had been turned out of the retreat in Normandy granted to 
him by the Conqueror. William Rufus, who now sat on his 
father's throne, marched into Lothian, where peace was again 
made by the mediation of Robert and Eadgar. Malcolm 
renewed his homage, and William renewed the grant made 
by his father of certain manors and a yearly payment of 
twelve marks. But William did not keep to the terms of the 
treaty, and when Malcolm complained of this breach of good 
faith he was summoned to appear before the English court 
at Gloucester. He went, but soon came away again, justly 
incensed at the insulting way in which he was treated by 
being put on the same level as the Norman barons. For the 
fifth time Malcolm entered England at the head of an army, 
but from this expedition there was no triumphant return, for 
the king and his son were slain on the banks of the A hie, 
and the host that had followed them fled in great confusion. 
19. Margaret's Reforms. — The disaster did not end 
with the death of the king, for the good Queen Margaret, 
who was then at Edinburgh, died of grief almost immediately 
after hearing the sad tidings. This good woman, whose 
many merits have won for her the title of saint, was the chief 
worker in the revolution which was being silently wrought in 
the manners of the court, and of the people, and in the govern- 
ment of the Church and of the State. The influence which 
her piety and learning gave her over her husband and his 
people was used to soften their fierceness, and to win them 
from their own half-savage ways to the customs of more civi- 
lized countries. She is said to have introduced silver plate 
at court, and many other luxuries of which the Scots had 
hitherto been ignorant ; she encouraged literature and com- 
merce, but she chiefly busied herself in reviving the state of 
religion, which had sunk to a very low ebb. The Church had 
fallen from its ancient purity and zeal, and had become a prey 



L] ECCLESIASTICAL REFORMS. 17 

to many singular abuses. The abbotships were hereditary in 
the great families, and were often held by laymen, and the 
religious foundations were in the hands of a body of irre- 
gular clergy called Culdees, from two Latin words meaning 
'servants of God.' Margaret called a council of the clergy 
and spoke to them herself, her husband acting as her inter- 
preter, and did her best to make them give up their peculi- 
arities and give in to the usages of the rest of Christendom. 
She rebuilt the church of lona, which had suffered so terribly 
at the hands of the Northmen, and founded a new church 
at Dunfennline, in which she and her husband were buried. 

20. Disputed Succession. Dcnald, 1093-1097. — The death 
of the King and of his son Eadward, who had been recog- 
nized as heir-apparent, threw the kingdom into confusion; 
and the Gaelic party, who had looked on with disgust and 
jealousy at the changes of the last reign and at the displace- 
ment of the Gaelic chiefs by the English immigrants, elected 
Donald Bane, Malcolm's brother, to the vacant throne. 
Meanwhile Duncan, the son of Malcolm and Ingebiorg, his 
first wife, prayed William of England to aid him in recover- 
ing his father's kingdom, which he promised to hold as an 
English fief. His suit was granted, and with the help of. an 
English and Norman army he drove out his uncle and 
reigned a few months. But Donald, with the help of Ead- 
inund, the eldest surviving son of Malcolm and Margaret, 
once more got the upper hand, murdered Duncan, exiled the 
rest of the family, and kept possession of the throne for three 
years. At the end of that time Eadgar the ^Etheling was 
sent north with an English army, and placed his nephew 
Eadgar on the throne on the same terms as those which 
had been granted to Duncan. Donald Bane was taken, 
and, after the cruel custom of the time, his eyes were put out 
before he was cast into prison. Eadmund died a penitent 
in an English monastery. 

M C 



1 8 THE GAELIC PERIOD. [chap. 

21. End of the Gaelic Period. — With Donald ends the 
Gaelic or Celtic period. The sons of Margaret carried out 
the reforms begun by their mother, and the Celtic customs 
gave way more and more to the Saxon influence both in 
the court and in the country. The King identified himself 
with his new nobles and with his English earldom, so that 
Lothian, as it was the richest, became the most prominent 
part of his dominions, and the true Scots of the North came 
to be looked on as savages and aliens, the natural enemies 
and perpetual disturbers of all peace and prosperity. The 
records of this period are so very scanty that any ideas of the 
state of the country or of the habits of the people are ex- 
tremely misty, and are chiefly drawn from incidental notices 
of Scottish matters in the chronicles of other lands. The 
chief architectural fragments which remain to bear witness to 
its Christianity are the round bell-towers in the Irish style at 
Brechin and at Abernethy. The church at Brechin was 
founded by Kenneth the Third. 

22. Summary. — The most noteworthy events in this the 
first period of Scottish history are the repulses which the 
Romans met with from the Picts ; the coming of the Scots 
from Ireland ; their union with the Picts under Kenneth 
MacAlpin ; the introduction of Christianity by Columba ; 
the conversion of the Picts and of the English, and the join- 
ing on of Strathclyde and Lothian to the Scottish Crown/ 
We must also notice the strong feeling of hereditary right 
which kept the succession for so long in one family, and the 
remarkable revolution brought about by the English exiles, 
which completely turned the current of the national life, and 
led to much strife and bitterness between the two races of 
which the nation was made up. 



II.] INVASION OF THE NORTHMEN. 19 



CHAPTER II. 

THE ENGLISH PERIOD. 

Eadgar ; invasion of Magnus (1) — English marriage (2) — 
Alexander I. ; rising in Moray (3) — Church reforms (4) — 
David I. (5)— English war {6)— Battle of the Standard (7) — 
peace with England (8) — internal improvements (9) — Malcolm 
IV. (10) — subjection of Galloway (11) — William the lion (12) 
— Convention of Falaise (13) — homage at Lincoln (14) — indepen- 
dence of the Church (15)— internal troubles (16) — social progress 
(17) — Alexander II. (18) — settling of the border line (19)— state 
of the North (20) — Alexander III. (21) — his marriage and 
homage to England (22) — last invasion of the Northmen (23) 
— literature and architecture (24) — state of the kingdom (25). 

1. Eadgar, 1097-1107. Invasion of Magnus. — In the be- 
ginning of this reign, Magnus Barefoot, King of Norway, made 
good his right to the Orkneys and the Scandinavian Earldom 
on the mainland. He seized the two earls, and placed his 
•own son Sigurd 'm their stead. He then sailed for the Sude- 
reys, at that time dependencies of the Kingdom of Man, wasted 
them with fire and sword, marked his claim by sailing round 
each island, and, by way of proving his right to Kintyre, is 
said to have had himself dragged across the isthmus that 
joins it to the mainland in his ship, with his hand on the 
tiller. On his death the islands fell back into the hands of 
the former owners, and their descendants, the Lords of the 
Isles, were afterwards wont to declare themselves vassals of 
Norway, whenever it suited their convenience. In one respect 
only did this expedition differ from the former piratical descents 
of the Northmen. This time the sacred island of Iona was 

C 2 



20 THE ENGLISH PERIOD. chap. 

respected, and the church, so lately rebuilt, was left uninjured 
by the special order of the King. 

2. English Marriage. — The friendly relations with England 
were maintained and strengthened by the marriage of Eadgar's 
sister Eadgyth, who took the name of Matilda, with Henry 
the First, the youngest son of William the Conqueror. She 
proved nearly as great a blessing to the English as her 
English mother had been to the Scots, for she taught the 
King to " love his folk," and was affectionately remembered 
by them as " Maud the good Queen." On his death-bed, 
Eadgar separated St7'athclyde from the rest of the kingdom, 
and conferred it on his brother David as a return for the 
wise counsel with which that brother had helped him through 
his very uneventful reign. 

3. Alexander I., 1107-1124. Northern Rising. — This King, 
unlike his easy-tempered brother, had a strong will and 
unyielding spirit. His reign was consequently a troubled 
one, as always happened when the Scots King tried to 
rule instead of being ruled by his turbulent subjects. His 
first difficulties were of course in the north. The men of 
Merne and Moray came forth secretly and swiftly, hoping 
to surprise and murder him ; but their tactics, which had 
proved fatal to Duncan, were upset by Alexander's discovery 
of the plot and rapid march to meet them. They were thus 
forced to fight, and thoroughly beaten on the northern shore 
of the Moray Firth, and the signal vengeance taken by the 
King after his victory, won for him the title of "the Fierce" 
To commemorate his success he founded the monastery 
of Scone. 

4. Church Reforms. — Alexander deserves to be remem- 
bered for the spirit and wisdom with which he upheld the 
independence of the national church. Anxious to carry out 
in the same spirit the reforms already begun by his mother, he 
appointed her confessor Turgot, Prior of Durham, to the See 



II. ] CHURCH REFORMS. 21 

Of St. Andrews, and asked the Archbishop of York to con- 
secrate him. The Archbishop on this claimed the canonical 
obedience of all the Scottish bishops, declaring that the 
whole country was in his province. This demand was 
clearly unjust ; for, though Lothian was undoubtedly so, the 
Scottish Church was older than his own, and had never been 
dependent on any foreign See. This difficulty was got over 
by the consecration of the new bishop by the Bishop of 
London, and Turgot was installed as head of the Church 
from which his own priory of Durham had originally 
branched off. Instead of identifying himself with the in- 
terests of his new charge, he did all he could to bring the 
Scottish Church under the authority of the Archbishop of 
York, so that he and the King soon quarrelled ; and as the 
King refused to let the Bishop go to Rome to lay his case be- 
fore the Pope, he resigned, and went back to Durham, where 
he shortly afterwards died. To evade the claims of York, 
the King resolved that his next bishop should be chosen from 
the southern province. Eadmer, a monk of Cante?'bnry, the 
friend and biographer of Anselm the Archbishop, accepted 
the bishopric. But he proved no better than Turgot, for he 
persisted in considering himself and his bishopric as de- 
pendent on Canterbury; and as the King would on no 
account agree to this, he too resigned and went away. 
Though he afterwards repented, and proposed to return, it 
was then too late, for Robert, P?'ior of Scone, had been 
appointed in his stead. As Alexander left no children, 
his brother David succeeded him, so that Strathclyde or 
Cumbria was re-united to the kingdom. 

5. David I., 1124-1153. Rising in Moray. — The usual 
rising in Moray took place in the early part of this reign. 
The Moray men seized the opportunity for revolt afforded 
them by David's absence in England, whither he had gone 
on some business connected with the Honour of Huntingdon, 



22 THE ENGLISH PERIOD. [chap. 

an English fief which he had got by his marriage with 
Matilda, daughter and heiress of Walt he of, Earl of Nort- 
humberland, who had been put to death by William the 
Conqueror. Angus and Malcolm, the representatives of the 
old Moray Mormaers, were descended in the female line from 
Lulach, the son of Gruach, and the northern party wished 
to place one of them on the throne. The Constable of the 
kingdom, the first on record, defeated them ; but as the 
rebellion still continued, David in alarm asked and obtained 
the aid of the barons of the north of England. He was 
preparing for his northern march, when the Celts took 
fright, and gave up their chief, who was imprisoned in Rox- 
burgh Castle. The district of Moray was declared forfeited, 
and was divided among the Norman knights whom David 
had drawn round him when Prince of Strathclyde. 

6. English War. — In 1135 Henry the First of England 
died, and David, who had been among the first to swear fealty, 
for the lands he held in England, to his own niece Matilda, 
daughter and heiress of Henry, was now the first to take up 
arms in defence of her right against Stephen. David at once 
marched into England, received the homage of the northern 
barons, and took possession of all the northern strongholds, 
except Bamborough, in Matilda's name. Stephen came north, 
but peace was made between them ; for though David would 
not break his oath to Matilda by himself holding any fiefs of 
Stephen, this difficulty was got rid of by investing David's 
son Henry with the Honour of Huntingdon, which had 
been hitherto held by David. Ca?Iisle and Doncaster were 
also conferred on Henry ; and though his request to be put 
in possession of his mother's inheritance of Northumberland 
was not granted, Stephen promised to take his claim to it 
into consideration. Henry went south with Stephen, at whose 
court he took precedence of the English barons. This roused 
their jealousy, and they straightway left the court in a body. 



ii.] BATTLE OF THE STANDARD. 23 

David, highly indignant at this insult, recalled his son, and 
the next year prepared to invade England again, nor would 
he agree to any terms of peace, unless Henry were put in 
immediate possession of Northumberland. In 1 138 his army 
ravaged the northern counties, reduced to ashes the castle of 
Norham, and routed a body of the men of Lancashire who 
had mustered to resist the invaders at Clitheroe on the Ribble. 
After this success, the victors committed greater outrages 
than ever. 

7. Battle of the Standard. — But their excesses, and the 
fear that David, as the representative of the English line, 
was trying to win the English crown for himself, at length 
roused the chivalry of northern England, who, forgetting 
party feeling, made common cause against the common foe, 
and assembled round the banner raised by Walter Esftec, a 
doughty and gigantic warrior. A few years before they had 
prepared to help David in suppressing those very Celts 
whom he was now leading against themselves. Against 
such men, inspired by such righteous indignation, the mixed 
multitude of Scots, Picts of Galloway, Welshmen from 
Strathclyde, Northmen from the Oi'k)ieys, and English from 
the Lothians, who with a body of Nori7ian knights made up 
the so-called Scottish host, had but small chance of success. 
This chance was made still smaller by what proved fatal to 
the cause of Scotland in many an after fight, the inevitable 
squabbles between the rival races. The Celts were jealous of 
the Norman strangers, and clamoured so loudly for their 
right of leading the van, that David at last gave in to them. 
His own better judgment would have led him to give the 
task of breaking the hostile ranks to his well-armed, well- 
mounted horsemen, leaving it to the infantry to follow up 
their advantage. The two armies met on a moor, near 
No?'thallerton, where the English were drawn up round their 
Standard, which was so singular that from it the battle took 



24 THE ENGLISH PERIOD. [chap. 

its name. It was the consecrated wafer hoisted on a ship's 
mast, with the banners of St. Peter of York, St. John of 
Beverley, and St. Wilfrith of Ripon, floating round it. Before 
the battle commenced, a last attempt for peace was made 
by two Norman barons, whose descendants afterwards played 
a great part in Scottish history. These were Robert de Brus 
and Bernard de Bailleul. They were friends of David 
and held lands from him, and they begged him not to 
fight with the old friends who had formerly stood by him. 
As he was unmoved by all their entreaties, they renounced 
their allegiance, and the battle began. The Galloway men 
made a fierce onslaught on the English, but were driven 
back and beaten down by the English arrows. They 
fled, and by their flight spread confusion through the 
army. The panic was made greater by a cry that the King 
was slain ; and though David did all he could to rally the 
fugitives round his banner, the ancient dragon of Wessex, 
he was forced to retire upon Carlisle, where his son Henry 
joined him a few days after. But this defeat did not drive the 
Scots out of England. David still continued the siege of 
Werk, a strong castle, which at last surrendered. 

8. Peace with England. — Next year, peace was made at 
Durham. Earl Henry was invested with the earldom of 
Northumberland, though Stephen kept Bamborough and 
Newcastle, and David continued to administer the affairs of 
the northern counties till his death. Two years after this 
peace he again took up arms in favour of Matilda, and nar- 
rowly escaped being taken prisoner when her forces were 
routed at Winchester; and it was by David at his court at 
Carlisle that her son Henry of Anjou was knighted. The 
close of David's life was embittered by the death of his 
only son Henry, a just man and a brave soldier, whose loss 
was universally lamented. He had married Ada de Warenne, 
daughter of the Earl of Surrey, and left three sons, Malcolm, 



II.] SOCIAL PROGRESS. 25 

William, and David, the two eldest of whom reigned in suc- 
cession. His eldest daughter Ada married Florence Count 
of Holland, and got the promise of Ross, a great tract of 
the Highlands, as her dowry. After the death of his son, 
David sent his eldest grandson through the provinces to be 
acknowledged as his successor, and within a few months 
he died at Carlisle, and was buried beside his parents at 
Dunfermline. 

9. Internal Improvements. — David was both a good man 
and a great king. He upheld the honour of his kingdom 
abroad, and did so much for the welfare of his people at home, 
that most of the social and political institutions of the later 
kingdom were afterwards ascribed to him. It is true that 
he introduced a foreign baronage, for he encouraged many 
Norman barons to come to his court, and by the lands which 
he gave them induced them to settle in the country. He 
thus gave great offence to the native chiefs ; but he did not 
forget the interests of the Commons, for he increased the 
number of the royal burghs and granted many privileges and 
immunities to the burghers. The life of David has been 
written by his friend and admirer, AEthelred the Abbot of 
Rievaulx. He has drawn an attractive picture of an able 
and virtuous prince, kindly and courteous alike to high and 
low ; ever ready to listen to the complaints of all his subjects 
and to set wrong right, and never turning his face away from 
any poor man. He tells us how the King himself dealt 
out justice to his subjects, and in his progress through the 
several districts of his kingdom, used, on set days, in per- 
son to hear the suits and to redress the wrongs of the poor 
and oppressed among his people. Six bishoprics — Dnnblatie, 
Brechin, Aberdeen, Ross, Caithness, and Glasgow — were 
either founded or restored by him ; and many abbeys date 
their foundation from his reign. He carried on the work 
of church reform by inducing the Culdees to conform to 



26 THE ENGLISH PERIOD. [CHAP. 

more regular ways, on pain of being turned out of their 
monasteries. His reign lasted twenty-nine years, during 
which time the country continued to advance steadily in 
wealth, fertility, and civilization. There is little doubt that, 
had his successor possessed the same abilities, the future 
boundary of the kingdom would have been the Tees instead 
of the Tweed. 

10. Malcolm IV., 1153-1165. — Malcolm was not quite 
twelve years old when he came to the throne : the fact that 
he retained possession of it proves that the principle of here- 
ditary succession was gaining ground, and that his grandfather 
David had put down the unruly spirit of the northern clans 
and had more firmly established a regular government. 

11. Subjection of Galloway. — The principal event of Mal- 
colm's reign was the subjection of Galloway, which was now 
reduced to direct dependence on the Crown. A rising, the object 
of which was to dethrone Malcolm and to set up his brother 
William in his stead, had been planned by some of the nobles 
while Malcolm was in Aquitaine, helping Henry the Second 
of England in his war with France. Soon after his return 
in 1 160, they surrounded the city of Perth where he was hold- 
ing his court, and tried to take him prisoner. But they were 
dispersed and routed, and though the chiefs fled to Galloway, 
Malcolm followed them and reduced the district. Fergus, the 
Lord of Galloway, ended his days in the monastery of Holy- 
rood. A few years later another dangerous enemy rose against 
Malcolm. This was Somerled, the Lord of Argyle, who ruled 
the western coast with the power, though without the title, of 
King. He landed near Renfrew on the Clyde, with a large 
force, but was almost immediately slain by treachery, and 
after his death his followers dispersed and returned to 
their several islands without doing any serious mischief. 
An increase of power was thus won for the Crown within 
the limits of the kingdom, but on the other hand the northern 



ii.] WILLIAM THE LION. 27 

counties of England, which had been held by David, were 
lost, for Henry of England obliged Malcolm to give up all 
claim to them at Chester, where the two Kings met in 11 57. 
At the same time Malco'.n was invested with the Honour of 
Huntingdon on the same terms as those on which it had 
been held by David. 

12. William the Lion, 1165-1214. — William surnamed 
the Lion succeeded his brother Malcolm. He was eager to 
regain the earldom of Northumberland, which his father had 
held and which his brother had lost. As Henry of England 
refused it to him, he aided the sons of that monarch in their 
rebellion against their father, and, when Henry was absent 
in France, he invaded his kingdom and took several strong- 
holds. But by his own imprudence he was surprised and 
captured, with the best of his nobles, while tilting in a mea- 
dow close by the walls of Ahiwick, and was sent for greater 
security to Falaise, in Normandy, July n 74. 

13. Convention of Falaise.— In the end of the year Wil- 
liam regained his freedom by signing a treaty called the 
" Convention of Falaise" the hard terms of which were most 
humiliating, both to him and to Scotland. He was in future 
to hold his kingdom on the same terms of vassalage as those 
by which he now held Lothian, and as a token of further de- 
pendence his barons and clergy were also to do homage to 
the English King, who was to be put in possession of the 
principal strongholds. His brother David, Earl of Hunt- 
ingdon, and twenty-one other barons were to remain as hos- 
tages till the strongholds were given up, and on their release 
each was to leave his son or next heir as a warrant of good 
faith. The homage was performed in the following year, 
when William met Henry at York; and the King of Scots, 
with his earls, barons, free-tenants, and clergy, became the 
liegemen of the King of England in St. Peter's Minster. 
The clergy swore to lay the kingdom under an interdict, and 



28 THE ENGLISH PERIOD. [chap. 

the laity to hold by their English over-lord, should William 
prove unfaithful to him. This treaty remained in force till 
the death of Henry in 1 1 89, when Richard of England, who 
was in want of money for his crusade, released William, for 
the sum of 10,000 marks, from these extorted obligations and 
restored the strongholds, though he refused to give up to him 
the coveted earldom. 

14. Homage at Lincoln. — When John succeeded his 
brother on the throne of England, William did such homage 
to him as the King of Scots had been wont to render 
to the King of England before the treaty of Falaisc He 
met John at Lincoln, whither he was escorted by a brilliant 
retinue of English barons. But there was no kindly feeling 
between the two Kings. John tried to build a castle at 
Tweedmouth in order to spoil the trade of Berwick, the 
largest trading city in Scotland, but the Scots drove away 
the builders and levelled the castle, and for some time both 
Kings kept threatening armies on the Border. 

15. Independence of the Church.— At a great Council held 
at Northampto7i in 1 1 76, the Archbishop of York claimed 
Scotland as a part of his province, and called on the Scot- 
tish clergy to acknowledge their dependence. They pro- 
tested and appealed to the Pope, who forbade the Arch- 
bishop to press his claim. Clement III. in 11 88 confirmed 
their claim of independence, on the ground that the Church 
of Scotland was in immediate dependence on the Holy See. 

16. Internal Troubles.— During William's captivity, Gallo- 
way revolted. All the King's officers were either slain 01 
expelled, and as, after the submission at Falaise, Gilbert the 
chief of Galloway considered himself a vassal of England, 
he let the Lothians have no peace till his death in 11 85. 
William's nephew Roland then seized Galloway, drove out his 
opponents, and rebuilt the Royal castles. William used his 
influence to induce Henry to confirm Roland in possession, 



II.] ALEXANDER THE SECOND. 29 

and thereby gained a devoted and faithful ally. It was 
mainly by his aid that William was enabled to put down 
a formidable rising in the north. 

17. Social Progress. — During this reign the free towns 
began to rise into notice. Their privilege of trade and right 
to govern themselves was recognized by a charter granted 
to the city of Aberdeen, in which William confirmed his 
burghers north of the Mount, in their right of holding their 
own court or " free anse," as they had done in the time of 
his grandfather David. Thus we see that the towns of the 
north of Scotland were united for mutual support a century 
before the rise of the great continental Hansa, which bound 
together by a similar league the trading cities of the Baltic. 
Some of the most important towns date their charters from 
William, and he extended the influence of civilization in the 
north by holding his court in such remote places as Elgin, 
Nairn, and Inverness. The only religious foundation of this 
reign was the abbey of Arbroath. It was dedicated to the 
newest saint in the calendar, Thomas of Canterbury. William 
died at Stirling in 12 14, leaving one son, Alexander, who 
succeeded him. 

18. Alexander II., 1214-1249. — Alexanders accession was 
the signal for one of the usual risings in Moray ; but as 
the power of the Crown in that district was now stronger than 
it had been in earlier times, this rising was more easily put 
down than any former one had been. The great struggle be- 
tween despotism and freedom had just at this time set John 
of England and his barons at variance. Alexander joined 
the barons in hopes of getting back Northumberland. He 
crossed the Border and received the homage of the northern 
barons, and the following year he joined his force to those of 
the confederates, and marched to Dover, where he did homage 
to Louis of France, who, at the invitation of the barons, had 
come over to take the crown. The death of John and the 



3° 



THE ENGLISH PERIOD. [chap, 



victory of his son, Henry the Third, at Lincoln, changed the 
whole state of affairs, and in 12 17 Alexander did the usual 
homage to Henry and was invested with the Honour of Hunt* 
ingdon. Four years later the bond between them was drawn 
closer by the marriage of Alexander to Joanna, Henry's sister. 
This alliance was followed by a lasting peace, though Alexan- 
der still claimed Northumberland, and Henry upheld the right 
of the Archbishop of York to supremacy over the Scottish 
Church. In a council held at York in 1237, Alexander agreed 
to compound his claim to the earldom for a grant of the lands 
of Penrith and Tynedale, and, when Henry went to France, 
he left the Border under the care of the King of Scots. 

19. Settling of the Border Line. — In 1222 an attempt was 
made to lay down a definite boundary between the two 
countries. Six commissioners on either side were appointed, 
and though the exact course of the line was disputed, from 
that time it continued pretty much what it is now, though a 
wide tract on either side was claimed alternately by both 
nations and belonged in reality to neither. 

20. State of the North. — A disturbance which happened 
during this reign shows us something of the lawless state of 
the northern part of the kingdom. Adam, bishop of Caith- 
ness, tried to enforce the payment of tithes in his diocese, 
but his people came together to consider the best way of re- 
sisting this exaction. While they were thus holding council, 
it is said that a voice cried out, " Short rede good rede ; slay 
we the bishop." On this advice they acted, for without more 
waste of words they attacked the bishop, and burned him 
and his house to ashes. Shortly before this a former 
bishop of Caithness had been seized and had his tongue cut 
out by the Earl of Orkney. Alexander died on an expedition 
to the Western Isles, at Kerrara, a small islet off the coast 
of Argyle. By his second wife, Mary o/Coucy, he left a son, 
who succeeded him. 



il] H AXON'S INVASION. 3 1 

21. Alexander III., 1 249-1 266. — Alexa?ider, a child of 
eight years, was crowned with great pomp at Scone, the 
ancient crowning place, where the famous stone of Destiny 
was kept. The tradition was that no one who had not been 
enthroned on this stone was lawful King of Scots. The 
most striking part of the coronation ceremony was the ap- 
pearance of a Sennachy or Celtic bard, who greeted Alexander 
as King by virtue of his descent from the ancient Celtic 
Kings, and recited the whole list of the King's ancestors, 
carrying them back to the most remote ages. This might 
serve to remind him that after all his title of King came 
solely from those very Celts whom his more immediate 
forefathers had slighted and despised. 

22. Alexander's Marriage and Homage to England. — On 
Christmas day, 125 1, Alexander was married at York, to Mar- 
garet, daughter of Henry the Third, and at the same time 
he did homage for the lands he held in England, but evaded 
Henry's claim of homage for Scotland, pleading the necessity 
of consulting his advisers before giving an answer on so diffi- 
cult a matter. This question was brought up again in 1278, 
when Alexander went to Westminster to acknowledge and to 
do homage to Edward the First, and he gave for answer that 
he did homage for his English fiefs alone and not for his king- 
dom. Edward asserted his right as over-lord of the king- 
dom, but he did not then attempt to enforce it. 

23. Last Invasion of the Northmen. — In 1262 Hakon of 
Norway came with a great fleet to visit the Orkneys and the 
Western Isles, Sndereys or Sottthern Isles as the Northmen 
called them. The fleet sailed down the Western Coast, 
levying black mail on the islands and making divers inland 
raids. Among other exploits the Northmen dragged a number 
of their ships across the narrow neck of land that parts Loch 
Long from Loch Lomond, sailed down Loch Lomond, and 
harried the Lennox, as the fertile tract which stretches along 



32 THE ENGLISH PERIOD. [chap. 

its lower end is called. Kakon sailed up the Firth of 
Clyde, and an attempt was made at a peaceable agreement 
between him and the King, who was at first willing to give 
up all claim to the Hebrides, but wished to keep the Cum- 
braes, Bute, and Arran. But the Scots purposely delayed 
coming to terms, as they expected that the autumn storms 
would soon help them to get rid of their enemy. Nor were 
their hopes disappointed, for, in the beginning of October, 
a violent tempest rose, separated the ships of the invaders, 
sunk some, and stranded others. On the following day 
the Northmen who had landed were easily beaten, near Largs, 
by a Scottish army hastily got together on the coast of Ayr, 
in 1263. Hakon died in one of the Orkneys on his way home, 
and his son, in 1266, agreed to give up Man and the Isles 
for 1,000 marks down, and the promise of 100 yearly. An 
amnesty was granted to the Islesmen, and it was settled that 
the bishopric should continue in the province of Drontheim. 
In 1 28 1 the King's daughter, Margaret, married Eric, the 
heir to the throne of Norway. She died in 1283, leaving 
an infant daughter, who, a few months after, by the death of 
Alexander, the King's only son, became heir to the Scot- 
tish crown. Three years later, in 1286, the King himself 
was killed by a fall from his horse while riding by night 
along the coast of Fife, near Kinghomr • 

24. Literature and Architecture. — No chronicles of this 
period, written by natives of Scotland, have come down to 
us. But there was one poet who was held in great repute, 
not only for his verses, but for his prophecies. This was 
Thomas Lear?nouth of Ercildoun, called "Thomas the 
Rhymer," and " True Thomas," from the general belief in 
the truth of his predictions. He is said to have foretold that 
great national calamity, the King's death, under the figure of 
a great storm that should blow " so stark and Strang, that all 
Scotland sail reu efter rycht lang." Another Scotsman of 



n.] STATE OF THE KINGDOM. 33 

note was Michael Scot, the famous wizard. He travelled 
much in foreign lands, and was greatly renowned in them, 
as in his own country, as a scholar, an astrologer, and 
magician. The buildings of this period were chiefly the 
churches and abbeys founded by Margaret and her descen- 
dants. They were all in the s"ame style as contemporary 
buildings in England. There were as yet very few castles, 
that is fortified buildings of solid masonry, in the kingdom. 
The great strongholds, such as Edinburgh, Stirling, and 
Dunbarton, were steep rocks, made so inaccessible by 
nature that they needed but little strengthening from art. 
Dwelling-houses seem to have been generally built of wood. 
25. State of the Kingdom.— The second period of the 
national history breaks off abruptly with the death of Alex- 
ander. It had begun with the dethronement of Donald Bane, 
the last Celtic King, nearly two hundred years before, and 
during that time the boundary of Scotland had been ex- 
tended by the annexation of Argyle and of the Isles, while 
her two dependencies of Lothian and Galloway had been 
drawn more closely to her, though they still remained 
separate and distinct. Throughout this period the influ- 
ence of England, though peaceable, had been stronger than 
it was ever to be again. English laws and English customs 
had been brought in, and had, in many cases, taken the place 
of the old Celtic usages. The Celtic maers had been 
removed to make way for the shei'iffs of the Crown. But, as 
Scotland was not divided like England into shires, the 
sheriffs were not, as in England, the reeves of the already 
existing shires, but officers who were placed by the King 
over certain districts. These districts or sheriffdoms became 
the counties of later times. Feudalism after the Norman 
model, with all its burthensome exactions and oppressions, 
had been brought in and had taken firmer root in Scotland 
than it ever did in England. The native chiefs had been 

M D 



34 THE ENGLISH PERIOD. [chap. 

displaced by foreign nobles, so that a purely Norman 
baronage held the lands, whether peopled by a Celtic or a 
Saxon peasantry. In some cases the new owners founded 
families afterwards known under Celtic names ; for, while 
the Celts gave their own names to the lands on which 
they settled, the Normans took the names of the lands con- 
ferred upon them and bore them as their own. The long 
peace with England, which had lasted unbroken for nearly 
a century, had been marked by great social progress. The 
large proportion of land that was now under the plough 
proves that during this untroubled time husbandry must have 
thriven, roads and bridges were many and in good repair, 
and the trading towns had made great advances in riches 
and power. Hitherto no one town had distinctly taken its 
place as the capital. Saint John's Town, or Perth, had, 
from its connexion with Scone, some claim to the first 
place, but the King held his court or his assize indifferently 
at any of the royal burghs. These burghs were of great im- 
portance in the state, and, as the burgesses of the royal 
burghs were all vassals holding direct from the Crown, they 
acted in some sort as a check on the growing power of the 
nobles. The burghers had the right of governing them- 
selves by their own laws, and were divided into two groups. 
Those north of the Scots water or Firth of Forth were 
bound together by a league like the great continental Hansa, 
and known by the same name ; while those in Lothian, re- 
presented by the four principal among them — Roxburgh, 
Stirling, Edinburgh, and Berwick — held their "court of 
the four burghs," which is still represented by the " Con- 
vention of Royal Burghs " which meets once a year in 
Edinburgh. Nor were ihe Scottish towns of this period 
in any way behind the cities of the Continent. Berwick, 
the richest and the greatest, was said by a writer of the 
time to rival London, hiverness had a great reputation for 



in.] THE REGENCY. 35 

shipbuilding. A ship which was built there called forth the 
envy and wonder of the French nobles of that time. But 
this happy state of things was brought to an end by the death 
of the King, and the long years of war and misery that fol- 
lowed went far to sweep away all traces of the high state 
of civilization and prosperity that had been reached by the 
country in this, the golden age of Scottish history. 



CHAPTER III. 

STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE. 

The Regency (1) — the Interregnum (2) — Council at Norham (3) — 
Edward's decision (4)— John (5) — his coronation (6) — French alli- 
ance (7) — Edzvard 's first conquest (8) — English government (9) — 
Wallace's revolt (10) — surrender at Irvine (i 1) — battle of Stirling 
(12) — battle of Falkirk (13) — capture of Wallace (14) — attempted 
union (15) — Bruce 's revolt (16) — his coronation (17) — Edward's 
proposed 7-evenge (18) — Bruce 's struggles (19) — battle of Bannock- 
burn (20) — results of the victory (21) — Bruce' s comrades (22) — 
summary (23). 

I. Margaret, 1286-90. The Regency. — Within a month 
from Alexander's death the Estates met at Scone, and ap- 
pointed six regents to govern the kingdom for Margaret, the 
Maiden of Norway, a child of three years old, who, on the 
death of her grandfather Alexander, succeeded to the throne. 
Three of these regents were for the old kingdom, the land 
north of the Scots Water, and three for Lothian with Gal- 
loway. This division seems to show that the different tenure 
of these provinces was still understood and acted on. The 
Scots of the original Celtic kingdom and the Englishme7i of 
Lothian still kept aloof from one another. In the meantime 
Robert Bruce, a Norman baron whose forefathers had settled 

D 2 



36 STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE. [chap. 

in Annandale in the twelfth century, made an attempt to 
seize the crown by force. He laid claim to it by right of his 
descent from Isabella, the second daughter of David Earl 
of Huntingdon, brother of William the Lion, and appealed 
to Edward the First of England as over-lord to support him 
in his supposed right. At the same time other appeals against 
him were made by the seven Earls of Scotland, by Eraser 
bishop of St. Andrews, and by the Community. Edward did 
not encourage Bruce, but on the contrary he agreed to the pro- 
posal of the Estates that the Lady Margaret should be mar- 
ried to his eldest son Edward. By the treaty of Brigham, in 
1290, this agreement was accepted by the Clergy, Nobility, 
and Community of Scotland. This treaty provided that the 
rights and liberties of Scotland should remain untouched ; 
that no native of Scotland was to be called on to do homage 
or to answer for any crime beyond the Border ; in short, 
that Scotland was to keep all the rights and liberties which 
belong to a distinct national life. This union, if it had been 
carried out, would have been the best possible settlement for 
both kingdoms, but it was prevented by the death of the 
Maid of Norway on her way to Scotland, in one of the 
Orkneys, September 1290. Edward had himself sent a ship 
handsomely fitted out to fetch home the Maid. 

2. Interregnum, 1290-92. — Margaret was the last of the 
legitimate descendants of William the Lion. The new 
King had to be sought among the heirs of William's 
brother David, Earl of Huntingdon. David had left three 
daughters, Margaret, Isabella, and Ada, and they being 
dead were represented by their nearest heirs, — Margaret by 
her grandson John Balliol, Isabella by her son Robert Bruce, 
and Ada by her son John Hastings. Besides these there 
were a host of smaller claimants whose pretensions were 
quite untenable ; but there was one other who, though his 
claim was very shadowy, was first in power and position 



in.] COUNCIL AT NORHAM. 37 

among the claimants. This was Flo?~ence, Count of Holland, 
the great-great-grandson of Ada, the daughter of David's son 
Kenry, who was to have had Ross as her dowry. Bruce, sup- 
ported by his son, by James the Steward and by other nobles, 
made a bond with Florence by which each pledged him- 
self, in case he got the kingdom, to give the other a third of 
it. Edward, as over-lord, was appealed to to settle the 
matter, as it was feared by the regents that Robert Bruce 
would seize the crown by force, and all the competitors seem 
to have acknowledged Edward's right of superiority. 

3. Council at Norham. — Edward accordingly summoned 
his barons, amongst whom most of the claimants could be 
reckoned, to meet him in a council at Norham, on the northern 
side of the Tweed, in June 1291, to decide this important 
case. The real contest lay between B?nce and Balliol. Bruce, 
Balliol, and indeed nearly all the claimants, were Norman 
barons holding lands of Edward. The family of Bruce came 
originally from the Cotentin and had been settled in Yorkshire 
by William the Conqueror, towards the end of his reign. 
David, who had granted to them the great tract of Annan- 
dale, had also granted to the Balliols a manor in Berwick. 
Bruce's plea was that, though he was the child of a younger 
sister, still his right was better than that of Balliol, as he 
was one degree nearer their common forefather, and he 
brought forward many precedents to prove that in such a 
case nearness in degree was to be preferred to seniority. 

4. Edward's Decision. — Edward decided with perfect jus- 
tice, according to the ideas of modern law, that Balliol, as 
the grandson of the eldest daughter, had the best right to the 
throne. In early times in Scotland no one would have 
thought of doubting Bruce's claim as next in degree. As 
Edward refused to divide the dominions among the heirs of 
the three daughters, it is clear that he looked on Scotland 
as a dependent kingdom, and not as an ordinary fief, which 



38 STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE. [chap. 

would have been shared among the three rivals. Judgment 
was given at Berwick, November 1292, eighteen months 
after the first meeting of the council. During this time the 
government had been nominally in the hands of the guardians 
of the kingdom ; but Edward had the strongholds, twenty- 
three in number, in his own hands, and seems to have looked 
upon the two countries as really united. At the end of the 
suit he gave up the strongholds, and by so doing showed 
that he meant to act fairly. 

5. John, 1292-96. Policy of Edward. — The great scheme 
of Edward's life was to unite Britain under one government, 
of which he himself was to be the head. He had already 
added to England the dependent principality of Wales. 
Hitherto his actions towards Scotland had been perfectly fair 
and upright. In placing John Balliol, the rightful heir, on the 
throne, he was doing no more than had been done by the 
King of England, acting as over-lord, in the cases of Mal- 
colm Canmore and Eadgar : but his way of placing him there 
was not strictly just ; the conditions which he required were 
such as he had no right to exact, nor John to accept. He 
made him do homage for his kingdom as though it had been 
an English fief. Now, though this was true as far as con- 
cerned Lothian, and partly true as concerned Strathclyde, as 
concerned Scotland it was untrue. Although Scotland had, 
since 924, been in some degree subject +o the King of Eng- 
land, this dependence was no more than was implied by the 
" commendation," the very natural relation of the weaker to 
the stronger. But it must be remembered that three centuries 
had passed since that first commendation, and in that time 
the original simplicity of the feudal tenure had been alto- 
gether changed and in great measure forgotten. Edward 
looked on the three parts of Scotland as fiefs, and therefore 
subject to the same burthens as his other fiefs ; the Scots 
knew that they were not thus subject, and they therefore 



in.] ALLIANCE WITH FRANCE. 39 

argued that their kingdom was in no way dependent on 
England : thus both parties were partly right and partly 
wrong. Even the amount of dependence implied in the 
original commendation had, in the last reign, been refused 
by the Scottish King, and had not been insisted on by the 
English one. But John Balliol was weak and foolish, while 
Edward was wise, strong, and determined to rule the whole 
country indirectly through his submissive vassal. 

6. Coronation of John. — John was duly crowned and en- 
throned on the Stone of Destiny, after which he renewed his 
homage to Edward, in 1292. He then summoned the Estates 
at Scone. This was the first meeting of the Estates which 
was called a fiarliajnent. John was not popular with his 
subjects, who looked on him as a tool in the hands of 
Edward. Before many months had passed Roger Bartholo- 
mew, a burgess of Berwick, being dissatisfied with a decision 
given against him in Scotland, appealed to Edward, who 
named a council at Newcastle to hear the case. This was a 
direct violation of the treaty of Brigham, and Edward obliged 
John to sign a discharge and renunciation of this treaty and 
of any other document then in existence which might call in 
question his superiority. Another appeal was made a few 
months afterwards against the decision of the Estates by a 
Scot of the old kingdom, Macduff, the grand-uncle of the Earl 
of Fife, and this was followed by appeals respecting the lands 
of the houses of Bruce and Douglas. John was summoned 
to appear before the Parliament of England, was voted a 
contumacious vassal, and commanded to give up the three 
principal strongholds of his kingdom into the hands of his 
over-lord till he should give satisfaction. 

7. French Alliance. — In 1294 war broke out between 
France and England, and John, with the nobles and commons 
of his kingdom, entered into an alliance for mutual defence 
with Eric of Norway and Philip of France against Edward. 



40 STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE. [chap. 

This was the beginning of the foreign policy maintained in 
Scotland for several centuries, until the Reformation, when 
religious sympathy got the better of national hatred, and 
Roman Catholic France became more dreaded than Pro- 
testant England. In compliance with this treaty a Scottish 
army crossed the Border and swept and wasted the northern 
counties. 

8. Edward's first Conquest.— Edward's dealings with 
Scotland now became those of a conqueror instead of a 
protector. The Scots had, without gainsaying, acknowledged 
his supremacy. It was the appeal of Scottish subjects which 
had tempted him to extend the incidents of that supremacy 
beyond legal limits, and now it was the Scots who began 
the war, and thus gave Edward the excuse, for which he was 
waiting, for conquering their country. He at once marched 
northwards with a great army, and besieged and took 
Berwick, a large and wealthy trading town. Provoked by the 
resistance and insults of the citizens, the King wreaked a 
fearful vengeance on them, and Berwick was reduced to the 
rank of a common market-town. While he was at Berwick, 
John's renunciation of fealty was sent to him by the party of 
independence, who were keeping their King in custody lest 
he should repent and submit. When Edward had secured 
Berwick, he marched to Dunbar, took the castle, and then 
went on to Edinburgh. He there took up his quarters in 
Holyrood, laid siege to the castle, took it, seized the crown 
jewels, and then passed on to Perth, taking possession of 
Stirling on the way. To crush out all idea of an indepen- 
dent kingdom, and to let the people see that they were 
conquered, he carried off from Scone the Stone of Destiny, 
with which the fate of the Scottish monarchy was supposed 
to be mystically joined. This stone was removed to Westmin- 
ster, and was placed under the seat of the coronation-chair. 
He also took with him the Holy Rood of Queen Margaret, 



in.] THE ENGLISH GOVERNMENT. 41 

and obliged all the nobles who submitted to him to swear 
allegiance on this much valued relic. Edward did not go 
further north than Elgin, and he returned to Berwick in 1296, 
having marched all through Scotland in twenty-one weeks. 
All the nobles and prelates did personal homage to him. 
John submitted himself to Edward's pleasure, and was de- 
graded and dispossessed. He was then sent as a prisoner to 
England, was afterwards made over to the keeping of the 
Bishop of Vicenza, the Pope's representative, and at last 
he retired to his own estates in Picardy, where he died in 
1315. Edward treated his kingdom as a fief forfeited by the 
treason of the vassal who held it. This notion of the thir- 
teenth century, that the fief was forfeited by treason, would 
not have occurred to anyone in the tenth century, when 
probably John would only have been deposed, and some one 
else set up in his stead. The seizure of Normandy from 
John of England by Philip of France was a case of the same 
kind, and quite as unprecedented. 

9. English Government. — Edward at once took measures 
for joining Scotland on as an integral part of the English 
kingdom. He took care that the strongholds should be 
commanded and garrisoned by persons without any Scottish 
connexion. He appointed John, Earl of Warrenne and 
Surrey, Guardian, Hugh of Cressingham, Treasurer, and 
Ormsby, Justiciar of the kingdom ; sent them forms of writs 
to be used in the re-granting of lands ; took measures for 
the establishment of Courts of Cnancery and Exchequer at 
Berwick, and summoned a council of merchants to consider 
the best measures for the future conduct of the trad, and 
commerce of the country. Cressingham was enjoined to 
raise all the money he could, for the maintenance of internal 
peace and order, and to put down the wicked rebels, homi- 
cides, and disturbers of the peace, who swarmed all over 
the land. 



42 STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE. [chap. 

ro. Wallace's Revolt. — The Celts in the North looked on 
this change in the government with apathy. To them it pro- 
bably made little difference who sat on the Scottish throne, 
and Edward had not entered their district. The Norman 
nobles quietly agreed to it, for they were afraid of losing 
their estates in England. But it roused a spirit of defiance 
and opposition where resistance was least to be looked for, 
among the Lowlanders. They were the descendants of the 
earliest Teutonic settlers, and had remained more purely 
English in blood and speech than their kinsfolk on the 
southern side of the Border. This latent feeling of dis- 
content gradually ripened into rebellion, and the standard of 
revolt was raised by William Wallace, a native of Clydes- 
dale, who, unlike most of his countrymen, had not sworn 
allegiance to Edward. He surprised and cut to pieces the 
English garrison at Lanark, and slew William Haselrig, the 
newly appointed sheriff of Ayr. This outbreak was followed 
by similar attacks on detached bodies of the troops in occu- 
pation. His little band of followers gradually attracted more, 
and at length they surprised the Justiciar Ormsby, while 
holding a court at Scone, and, though he escaped out of 
their hands, they secured both prisoners and booty. Anthony 
Beck, Bishop of Durham, was next attacked in Glasgow, and 
forced to flee. After these successes Wallace was joined 
by William of Douglas, a renowned soldier, and by Robert 
Bruce, Earl of Carrick, grandson of the original claimant of 
the crown. 

II. Surrender at Irvine. — But there was a want of system 
and of unity of purpose in the nation, and this noble effort 
on the part of the people was not seconded by the nobles. 
A large army under Henry, Lord Percy, was sent by Edward 
to put down the rising ; those nf the nobles who had joined 
the popular movement deserted it, and renewed their alle_ 
giance to Edward at Irvine, July 1297. But when Edward, 



in.] BATTLE OF STIRLING. 43 

who believed the revolt to be completely crushed, was absent 
in Flanders, Wallace mustered the people of the Lowlands 
north of the Tay and made himself master of the strongholds 
in that district. 

12. Battle of Stirling. — The English army was now 
hastening northward under Cressingham and Warrenne, Earl 
of Surrey. Wallace resolved to give them battle on the Carse 
of Stirling, a level plain, across which the river Forth winds 
in and out among the meadows like the links of a silver chain. 
Wallace showed his skill as a general by the choice of the 
ground on which he posted his men. He drew them up within 
one of the links of the river, which swept round in front 
between them and the English, while a steep rocky hill, called 
the Abbey Craig, rose right behind them and protected the 
rear. The English had to cross the river by a narrow bridge. 
Wallace waited till half of them were over, and then attacked 
them. Taken thus at a disadvantage, they were easily routed. 
The panic spread to those on the opposite bank, who fled 
in disorder. In this action, called the Battle of Stirling, 
which was fought September 11, ^297,- Cressingham was 
slain, and Surrey was forced to retreat to Berwick. After this 
victory the Scots recovered the strongholds south of the 
Forth, and Wallace acted as Guardian of the kingdom in 
the name of King John, and with the consent of the com- 
mons. Unhappily the Scots were not content with driving 
out the invaders, but carried the war over the Border, and 
wasted the northern counties of England with all the fierce- 
ness and cruelty of brigands. 

Battle of Falkirk. — Edward returned from Flanders 
and raised a large army for the subjection of Scotland, pio- 
misin^ pardon to all vagrants and malefactors who would 
enlist in it. The King himself led the army. The Scots 
wasted the country and retreated before him through the 
Lothians ; and Wallace, who knew well the weakness of his 



44 STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE. [chap. 

own force, tried to avoid a battle till the great army of 
Edward should be exhausted from want of food. But tidings 
were brought to Edward that Wallace was near Falkirk, and 
he marched northward in haste and forced his enemy to give 
battle. At Stirling Wallace had won the day by his happy 
choice of the ground ; he now showed still greater skill by 
the way in which he drew up his little army. It was made 
up for the most part of footmen, who at that time were held 
of no account as soldiers. The genius of Wallace found out 
how they might be made even more formidable than the 
mounted men-at-arms, in whom at that time it was supposed 
that the strength of an army lay. He drew them up in 
circular masses ; the spearmen without and the bowmen 
within. The spearmen with lances fixed knelt down in 
ranks, so that the archers within could shoot over their 
heads. When his men were thus placed, Wallace said to 
them, " I have brought ye to the ring — hop gif ye can ; " that 
is, show how well you can fight. But, though they fought well 
and held their ground bravely, and the English horse were 
driven back by the spear-points, the Scots were at last beaten 
down by force of numbers, and the English won the day, 1298. 
After this victory Edward returned to Carlisle, and Wal- 
lace resigned the Guardianship. Edward held the country 
south of the Forth, but the northern Lowlands seem to have 
maintained their independence until the spring of 1303, when 
Edward marched north at the head of a great army and 
again subdued the whole country. He made Dunfermline, 
the favourite seat of the Scottish court, his head-quarters. 
Stirling Castle alone, under Olifant the valiant governor, 
held out for three months, but when it was taken the lives 
of the garrison were spared. All the leaders in the late 
rising were left unharmed in life, liberty, or estate, with the 
exception of William Wallace. He was required to submit 
unconditionally to the King's grace. 



in.] DEATH OF WALLACE. 45 

14. Capture of Wallace. — Wallace had been on the Con- 
tinent ever since the battle of Falkirk. He now came back 
and was betrayed by his servant Jack Short to Sir John 
Menteith, governor for Edward in Dunbarton Castle, and was 
sent by him to London. He was there tried, by a special 
commission, for treason rnd rebellion against Edward. He 
pleaded in his own defence that he had never sworn fealty 
to Edward. In spite of this he was found guilty, condemned 
to death, and hanged, drawn, and quartered according to the 
barbarous practice which was then coming into use in Eng- 
land. His head was stuck up on London Bridge, and the 
four parts of his body were sent to Newcastle, Berwick, 
Stirling, and Perth, by way of frightening the people from 
such attempts in future. 

15. Attempted Union. — Edward then set to work to com- 
plete the union of the two kingdoms. In the meantime 
Scotland was to be governed by a Lieutenant aided by a 
council of borons and churchmen. It was to be represented 
in the English parliament by ten deputies,— four churchmen, 
four barons, and two members of the commons, one for the 
country north of the Firths, one for the south. These 
members attended one parliament at Westminster, and an 
ordinance was issued for the government of Scotland. John 
of Bretayne was named Lieutenant for the King ; justices and 
sheriffs were appointed; the strongholds were put under 
governors for the King, and an inquiry was ordered into the 
state of the laws in order to take measures for their amend- 
ment. Edward's policy in all this was to win favour with 
the people and the members of the council, although many of 
them, such as Bruce and Wishart, Bishop of Glasgow, had 
taken part in the last rising. The King's peace was now 
offered to all rebels who would profit by it. But the great 
difficulty in dealing with the Scots was that they never knew 
when they were conquered, and, just when Edward hoped 



46 STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE. [chap. 

that his scheme for union was carried out, they rose in arms 
once more. 

16. Bruce's Revolt. — The leader this time was Robert 
Bruce, Lord of Annandale, Earl of Carrick in right of his 
mother, and the grandson and heir of the rival of Balliol. 
He had joined Wallace, but had again sworn fealty to 
Edward at the Convention of Irvine, and had since then 
received many favours from the English king. Bruce signed 
a bond with William Lamberton, Bishop of St. Andrews, 
who had also been one of Wallace's supporters. In this 
bond each party swore to stand by the other in all his 
undertakings, no matter what, and not to act without the 
knowledge of the other. The signing of such bonds became 
a prominent and distinctive feature in the after-history of 
Scotland. This bond became known to Edward ; and Bruce, 
afraid of his anger, fled from London to Dumfries. There in 
the Church of the Grey Friars he had an interview with 
John Corny n of Badenoch, called the Red Corny n, who, after 
Balliol and his sons, was the next heir to the throne. 
He was the grandson of a younger sister of Balliol's mother, 
and the son of Balliol's sister. He had also a strong claim 
to the favour of the people in his alleged descent, through 
Donald Bane, from their ancient Celtic kings. What passed 
between them cannot be certainly known, as they met alone, 
but Bruce came out of the church saying he feared he had 
slain the Red Comyn. Kirkpatrick, one of his followers, 
then said, he would " mak sicker," and ran in and slew the 
wounded man. By this murder and sacrilege Bruce put 
himself at once out of the pale of the law and of the Church, 
but by it he became the nearest heir to the crown, after the 
Balliols. This gave him a great hold on the people, whose 
faith in the virtue of hereditary succession was strong, and 
on whom the English yoke weighed heavily. 

17. Coronation at Scone. — On March 27, 1306, Bruce was 



m.] DEATH OF EDWARD. 47 

crowned with as near an imitation of the old ceremonies as 
could be compassed on such short notice. The actual crown- 
ing was done by Isabella, Countess of Buchan, who, though 
her husband was a Comyn, and, as such, a sworn foe of 
Bruce, came secretly to uphold the right of her own family, 
the Macduff's, to place the crown on the head of the King 
of Scots. 

1 8. Edward's proposed Revenge. — Edward determined 
this time to put down the Scots with rigour. Aymer of 
Valence, Earl of Pembroke, succeeded John of Bretayne as 
Governor. All who had taken any part in the murder of the 
Red Comyn were denounced as traitors, and death was to be 
the fate of all persons taken in arms. Bruce was excom- 
municated by a special bull from the Pope. The Countess 
of Buchan was confined in a room, made like a cage, in 
one of the towers of Berwick Castle. One of King Robert's 
sisters was condemned to a like punishment. His brother 
Nigel, his brother-in-law Christopher Seton, and three other 
nobles were taken prisoners, and were put to death as 
traitors. This, the first noble blood that had been shed in 
the popular cause, did much to unite the sympathy of the 
nobles with the commons, who had hitherto been the only 
sufferers from the oppression of the conquerors. Edward 
this time made greater preparations than ever. All classes 
of his subjects from all parts of his dominions were invited 
to join the army, and he exhorted his son, Edward Prince 
of Wales, and 300 newly-created knights, to win their spurs 
worthily in the reduction of contumacious Scotland. It was 
well for Scotland that he did not live to carry out his vows 
of vengeance. He died at Burgh-on-the-Sands, July 30th. 
His death proved a turning-point in the history of Scot- 
land, for, though the English still remained in possession 
of the strongholds, Edward the Second took no effective 
steps to crush the rebels. He only brought the army raised 



48 STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE. [chap. 

by his father as far as Cumnock in Ayrshire, and retreated 
without doing anything. 

19. Bruce's Struggles. — For several years King Robert 
was an outlaw and a fugitive, with but a handful of followers. 
Their lives were in constant danger. Whenever an oppor- 
tunity offered, they made daring attacks on the English in 
possession ; at other times they saved their lives by hair- 
breadth escapes from their pursuit. The Celts of the west 
and of Galloway, who had been won over to the English 
interest, were against them, and the Earl ofBuchan, husband 
of the patriotic Countess, and his kinsman, Macdougal of 
Lorn, were Bruce's most deadly enemies. At one time Bruce 
had met with so many defeats that he left Scotland and 
thought of giving up the struggle and going to the Holy 
Land. Tradition says that the example of a spider stirred 
him up to fresh courage and endurance. He was in hiding in 
the island of Rachrin, off the north coast of Ireland. As he 
lay one morning in bed in the wretched hut in which he had 
taken refuge, he saw a spider trying in vain to throw its web 
across from beam to beam of the roof above his head. The 
insect tried six times and failed. Bruce reckoned that he 
had been beaten just six times by the English. He watched 
eagerly to see if the spider would try again. "If it does," 
thought he, " so will I." Once more the spider made the 
attempt, and this time it was successful. Bruce took it as 
a happy omen, and went back to Scotland. He joined some 
of his followers in the Isle of Arran. From the island they 
went to the mainland, and from that time the tide of fortune 
seemed to turn, and to bring him good luck instead of bad. 
Still he had to go through many perils. The story of his 
exploits has been handed down to us by John Barbour, 
Archdeacon of Aberdeen. As he was born soon after Bruce's 
death, there may be some truth in the tales which he tells, 
though it must be borne in mind that they are but tales. 



in.] BATTLE OF BANNOCKBURN. 49 

He describes Bruce as a strong, tall man, so cheerful and 
good-humoured that he kept up the spirits of his followers 
no matter what mishaps befell them, always first in danger, 
and often owing his life to his own wit and daring. One of 
his best known feats happened in the country of John of 
Lorn. Three Highlanders, who had sworn to take his life, 
set upon him when he was quite alone. One seized his 
horse's bridle ; another tried to take his foot out of the 
stirrup ; the third, leaping on him from behind, tried to 
unhorse him. Bruce cut them all down and rode off trium- 
phant. His brooch had come loose in the struggle, and was 
ever afterwards kept as a precious relic in the family of his 
enemy Macdougal of Lorn. The first decided success of 
Bruce was the defeat of his old enemy, the Earl of Buchan, 
who with his followers joined the English, and forced Bruce 
to right near Inverary. Bruce won the day, and his followers 
so spoiled the lands of the Comyn that this fray was long 
remembered as the " Herryi?ig of Bucha.71." At length the 
clergy recognized Bruce as their King, and this virtual taking 
off the excommunication had a great effect upon the people. 
The little band of patriots increased by degrees. The strong- 
holds were won back, till at last only Stirling was left to 
the English, and it was so sorely pressed that the governor 
agreed to give it up to the Scots if he were not relieved 
before St. John Baptist's Day, 13 14. Roused by the fear 
of losing this, the most prized of all Edward the First's 
conquests, the English gathered in great force, and marched 
100,000 strong to the relief of the garrison. 

20. Battle of Bannockburn, June 24, 1314. — The Scots 
were posted so as to command the plain or carse of Stirling, 
which the English must cross to reach the Castle. They 
were greatly inferior to the English in numbers, and had 
scarcely any cavalry, in which the chief strength of the 
English force lay. Robert divided them into four battles or 

M E 



50 STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE. [chap. 

divisions. Their leaders were Sir James Douglas ; Randolf, 
his nephew; James the Stewart, and Bruce's own brother Ed- 
ward. Bruce himself commanded the fourth division, which 
was placed behind the others, as in it were the men he least 
trusted, and a small body of cavalry. One flank of the army 
rested on the Bannock, a small stream or burn, from which 
the battle took its name. Before the battle joined, as King 
Robert was reviewing his line, he was challenged to single 
combat by Henry of Bohun, an English knight, and raised 
the spirit of his followers by cleaving his adversary's skull. 
The English began the fight by a volley of arrows, but their 
archers were dispersed by the small body of the Scottish 
horsemen whom King Robert sent to charge them. The 
English cavalry then charged the Scots, but they tried in 
vain to break the compact bristling masses of the Scottish 
spearmen, and themselves fell into confusion. Some High- 
land gillies and camp-followers just then appeared on the 
brow of a neighbouring hill. The English took them for 
a reserve of the enemy, were seized with terror, fled in wild 
disorder, and the defeat became a total and shameful rout. 
The horsemen in their flight fell into the pitfalls which the 
Scots had cunningly sunk in the plain. King Edward and 
500 knights never drew rein till they reached Dunbar, whence 
they took ship for Berwick. Great spoil and many noble 
captives fell that day to the share of the victors. 

21. Results of the Victory. — By this battle, won against 
tremendous odds, the Saxons of the Lowlands decided their 
own fate and that of the Celtic people by whose name 
they were called, and to whose kingdom they chose to 
belong. On the field of Bannockburn they gave the English 
a convincing proof that they preferred sharing the poverty 
and turbulent independence of that half-civilized Celtic 
kingdom to rejoining the more wealthy, prosperous, and 
settled country from which three centuries before they had 



III.] BRUCE 'S COMRADES. 51 

been severed. Three more centuries were still to pass before 
Edward the First's great idea of a Union could be carried 
out. Bannockbum is noteworthy among battles as being 
one of the first to prove the value of Wallace's great 
discovery that footmen, when rightly understood and skil- 
fully handled, were, after all, better than the mounted men- 
at-arms hitherto deemed invincible. Like Morgarten and 
Courtray, the fields on which the Flemings and the Swiss 
about the same time overthrew their oppressors, this victory 
of the Scots stands forth as a bright example, showing how, 
even in that age of feudal tyranny, a few men of set purpose, 
fighting for their common liberty, could withstand a great 
mass of feudal retainers fighting simply at the bidding of 
their lords. 

22. Bruce's Comrades. — The faithful friends of Bruce, 
those who had shared his dangers and helped him to win 
his crown, were no way behind their leader in courage and 
heroism. The most famous of them all was James of Douglas, 
son of that Douglas who had been the friend and supporter 
of Wallace. His own Castle of Douglas was the scene of one 
of his most daring deeds, hence called the Douglas Larder. 
The English held his castle, but on Palm Sunday, when 
the garrison were gone to church, Douglas attacked them 
suddenly, killed some, and took the rest prisoners. He and 
his men then went up to the castle, where they feasted merrily 
on the fare that was being made ready for the English. 
When they had dined, Douglas bade them bring forth all the 
provision of food and fuel and pile it up in the castle hall. 
He then killed the English prisoners and flung their bodies 
on the heap. Over them he poured their store of wine, 
which mingled with the blood that still streamed from their 
gaping wounds. The Scots then set fire to the whole and 
went off to the woods again, for the free vault of heaven was 
more to their minds than the constraint of castle walls. All 

E 2 



52 THE INDEPENDENT KINGDOM. [chap. 

these stories are only tales ; but, whether true or not, they 
show the spirit of the time. 

23. Summary. — In this chapter we have seen how Scot- 
land lost her independence by the selfish quarrels of her 
nobles and the weakness of her King John Balliol ; how 
the rising of Wallace, the first effort for regaining her ancient 
freedom, was confined solely to the people without the nobles ; 
how it came to nothing from the want of unity of purpose 
in the nation; how Scotland, after the failure of this attempt, 
had lost her separate national life and had been united to 
England ; how, when all hope seemed lost, the people rose 
under a leader who was really a Norman baron, and there- 
fore as much a foreigner to them as any of the governors 
placed over them by Edward ; and how by one great effort 
they shook off the yoke of the invaders and drove them from 
the soil. 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE INDEPENDENT KINGDOM. 

Robert I. (1) — Chapter of Mitton (2)— Peace of Northampton (3) — 
Robert' 's parliaments (4) — his death (5) — David II. (6) — Edivard 
Balliol' s invasion (7) — battle of Halidon Hill (8)— capture of the 
King (9) — Robert II. (10) —the French allies ( 1 1)— Raid of Otter- 
burn (12) — Robert III. ( 13) — Clan battle on the North Inch ( 14) 
relations with England (15)— Albany's regency {16)— battle of 
Harlaw (17) — Scots in France (18)— death of Albany (19) — 
summary (20). 

1. Robert I., 1314-1329. — The independence which Scot- 
land had lost was won back on the field of Bannock- 
burn. She was to live on as an independent kingdom, 



iv.] CHAPTER OF MITTON. 53 

not to sink into a mere province of England ; but, as the 
English refused to acknowledge her independence, the war 
was carried on by repeated invasions and cruel wastings of 
the northern counties. Douglas, who was so popular that he 
was called the Good Lord James, and Randolf whom Bruce 
created Earl of Moray, were the chief heroes of these raids. 
Edward was attacked too in another quarter, in Irela?id, 
whither, at the call of the Celtic chiefs, Edward Bruce had 
gone, like his brother Robert, to win himself a crown by- 
valour and popularity. King Robert himself took over troops 
to help him. Edward was crowned King of Ireland, but he 
was killed soon after. Meanwhile the war on the Border 
still went on. Each side was struggling for Berwick. The 
Scots won it back, and the English did all they could to 
retake it, but in vain. 

2. Chapter of Mitton. — While the siege went on, the 
Border counties were so sorely harried by the Scots that at 
last the Archbishop of York and the clergy took up arms in 
their defence. But they were thoroughly beaten, and this 
battle was called the Chapter of Mitton, from the number 
of clerks left dead on the field. Edward could have ended 
all this by acknowledging Robert as King, but he would not. 
A two years' truce was made in 1319, but, as soon as it 
was ended, he once more invaded Scotland with a large 
army. He found nothing but a wasted country, for the 
Scots had carried both provisions and cattle to the hills, nor 
would they come out to fight, though they harassed the rear 
of the retreating army. At last the people of the northern 
counties of England grew weary of the constant struggle. 
They had suffered so much loss from the inroads of the Scots 
that they at last resolved that, if the King would not make 
peace for them, they must come to terms with the enemy on 
their own account. Edward, who feared that he might thus 
lose a part of his kingdom, agreed to a thirteen years' 






54 THE INDEPENDENT KINGDOM. [chap 

truce, which was concluded in 1323. In this treaty Robert 
was allowed to take his title of King, though the English 
would not give it him. But when a few years later Edward 
was deposed and his son Edward the Tlii?-d placed in his 
stead, his government would not confirm the truce in the 
form at first agreed on. The Scots upon this made another 
raid upon England, swept the country, and carried off their 
spoil before the eyes of a large English army. The Scots 
had in their plundering expeditions a great advantage over 
the English in the greater simplicity of their habits. They 
were mounted on small light horses, which at night were 
turned out to graze. They carried no provisions, except a 
small bag of oatmeal, which each man bore at his saddle, 
together with a thin iron plate on which he baked his meal 
into cakes. For the rest of their food they trusted to 
plunder. They burned and destroyed everything as they 
passed, and, when they seized more cattle than they could 
use, they slew them and left them behind on the place where 
their camp had been. 

3. Peace of Northampton. — As by this time Robert's title 
had, after much strife, been recognized by the Pope and other 
foreign powers, the English saw that they must acknowledge 
it too. Therefore a treaty was confirmed at Northampto7i 
in 1328 between Robert, King of Scots, and the English 
King. The terms of this treaty were, that Scotland as far 
as the old boundary lines should be perfectly independent ; 
that the two Kings should be faithful allies, and that neither 
should stir up the troublesome Celtic subjects of the other, 
either in Ireland or in the Highlands. As a further proof of 
good will, Joan, Edward's sister, was betrothed to Robert s 
infant son. By this treaty the original Commendation of 
924, and all the subsequent submissions to England, whether 
real or pretended, were done away with. It placed the king- 
dom on quite a new footing, for now Lothian and Strathclydt 



iv.] BRUCE 'S DEATH. 55 

were as independent of England as the real Scotland had 
originally been. The long time of common suffering and 
common struggles had done for the nation what the good 
time before it had failed to do. It had knit together the 
three strands of the different races into one cord of national 
unity too strong for any outer influence again to sever. But 
during the long war there had also arisen that intense hatred 
of everything English which warped the future growth of the 
nation. This hatred drove Scotland to seek in France the 
model and ally that she had hitherto found in England, and the 
influence of France can from this period be distinctly traced 
in the laws, the architecture, and the manners of the people. 
Robert's treaty with France was the beginning of the future 
foreign policy of Scotland. This was to make common 
cause with France against England, which country Scotland 
pledged herself to invade whenever France declared war 
against it. 

4. Robert's Parliaments. — Two of the meetings of the 
Estates or Parliaments of this reign deserve notice. That 
of 13 18 settled the succession to the crown : first, on the 
direct male heirs in order of seniority ; next on the direct 
female heirs ; failing both, on the next of kin. An Act was 
also passed by this parliament forbidding all holders of 
estates in Scotland from taking the produce or revenues of 
these lands out of the kingdom. This law acted as a sentence 
of forfeiture on the so-called Scottish barons who had larger 
estates in England than in Scotland, and who preferred 
living in the richer country. In the parliament of 1326, held 
at Cambuskenneth, the third Estate, that is, the members 
from the burghs, was first recognized as an essential part of 
the Natio7ial Assembly. 

5. His Death.— King Robert owed his crown to the people 
and to the clergy ; of the nobles but few were with hirru 
His reign made a great change in the baronage, for with 



56 THE INDEPENDENT KINGDOM. [chap. 

the forfeited estates of his opponents he laid the foundation 
of other families, the Doiiglases for instance, who in after- 
times proved the dangerous rivals of his own descendants. 
This was partly owing to his mistaken policy in granting 
royalties or royal powers within their own domains to certain 
of his own kindred and supporters. This practice, though at 
the time it strengthened his own hands, in the end weakened 
the power of the Crown. He died at Cardross in 1 329, leaving 
one son. He was greatly mourned by the people, for he had 
won their sympathy by the struggles of his early career, and 
had become their pride by his final victories. They were 
justly proud of having a king who was no mere puppet in 
the hands of others, fit only to wear a crown and to spend 
money, but a brave, wise man, who had shown himself as 
able to suffer want and to fight against ill-fortune as the 
best and bravest among themselves. After King Robert's 
death, Douglas, to fulfil his last wish, set out with his heart 
for Spain with a gallant following of the best gentlemen in 
Scotland. In a skirmish with the Moors, he was surrounded 
by the enemy, while hastening to the help of a brother 
knight. When he saw his danger, he took from his neck 
the silken cord from which hung the Bruce's heart, cast it on 
before him into the thickest of the fight, crying out, " Pass 
first in fight as thou art wont to do, and Douglas will follow 
thee or die." True to his word, he fell fighting valiantly, 
and his body was found near the casket, which held the heart 
of the friend and leader whom in life he had loved so well. 
Douglas was tall and strong, and his dark skin and black 
hair won him the nickname of the " Black Douglas." The 
English hated and feared him, but his own people loved him 
well and remembered him long after his death. 

6. David II., 1320-1370. — Davi'a, who was only eight years 
old when his father died, was crowned at Scone and anointed 
which no King of Scots had ever before been, as this was 



iv. 1 BALLIOIJS INVASION. 57 

considered the special right of independent sovereigns only. 
The government was in the hands of Randolf, who had been 
appointed Regent by the Estates before the death of the late 
king. In the early part of the reign the country was torn by 
a struggle which, as it was really a civil war, was more dan- 
gerous to its independence and more hurtful to the national 
character than the long war with the English had been. This 
war was caused by those barons who, holding large estates 
in England, had, by marriage or by inheritance, become pos- 
sessed of lands in Scotland, which they lost by the Act of 
the last reign against absentees. Hitherto the so-called 
Scottish nobles had been Norman barons, with equal in- 
terests in both kingdoms, but this act forced them to decide 
for one or the other. Hence it was the mere chance of the 
respective value of their lands that decided whether such 
names as Percy and Douglas should be feared north or south 
of the Border. 

7. Edward Balliol's Invasion. — These disinherited barons 
gathered round Edward Balliol, the son of King John, and 
determined on an invasion of Scotland on their own account, 
giving out that they came to win back the crown for him. 
Just at this time of threatened danger the Regent died, and 
was succeeded in his trust by Donald, Earl of Mar, another 
nephew of King Robert. The invaders landed on the coast 
of Fife, and at Duplin in Strathearn they defeated a large 
army under the command of the Regent, who was slain. 
They then took possession of Perth, and crowned Baliiol 
at Scone, September 24th, 1332. He acknowledged himself 
the vassal of Edward of England ; but the latter did not 
openly take a part in the war, until the Scots, by their fre- 
quent raids across the Border, could be said to have broken 
the Pcce of Northampton. 

8. Battle of Halidon Hill. — In the spring of 1 333, Edward 
the Third invested Berwick, and the governor agreed to give 



58 THE INDEPENDENT KINGDOM. [chap. 

It up if it were not relieved by the Scots within a given time. 
The new Regent, Archibald Douglas, brother to the Good 
Lord James, marched to raise the siege. It was very much 
the case of Bannockburn reversed, for now the English had 
the advantage of being posted on Halidon Hill, close by the 
town, while the Scots, the assailants, had to struggle through 
a marsh. The English archers won the day ; the Regent was 
killed ; Berwick was forced to yield ; and Balliol gave it over 
to the English, and placed all the strongholds south of the 
Forth in their hands. For three years longer there was much 
fighting on the Border with pretty equal success, until the 
French wars drew the attention of Edward the Third from 
Scotland, and then the national party began to get the upper 
hand. David, Earl of Athole, Balliol's chief supporter, was 
defeated and slain at Culbleen, in the Highlands ; and when 
Robert the High Steward became Regent in 1338, he won 
back the strongholds. Soon after, Balliol left the kingdom, 
and in 1341 David and his Queen Joan of E?igla7id came 
home from France, where he had been sent to be out of the 
way of the troubles. Five years of comparative peace fol- 
lowed. A succession of truces were made with England, but 
they were not strictly kept on the Border. 

9. Capture of the King. — While Edward was busy 
with the siege of Calais, David, to keep up the spirit of the 
alliance with France, broke the truce between England and 
Scotland by invading England. He was defeated and cap- 
tured by the Archbishop of York at the head of the force 
of the northern counties in 1346. The battle in which he 
was taken was called the battle of Neville's Cross, from a 
cross afterwards put up to mark the field by Sir Ralph 
Neville. For eleven years David remained a captive, and 
Scotland was governed by the former Regent, the Steward. 
During that time Berwick was won and lost again. Edward, 
to whom Balliol had handed over his claim to the kingdom 



iv.] ROBERT THE SECOND. 59 

for a pension of two thousand pounds, brought an English 
army as far as the Forth. As they could neither find pro- 
visions to sustain them nor an enemy to fight with, they were 
forced to return ; but they had left such traces of their progress 
on churches and dwelling-houses that their inroad was re- 
membered as the "burnt Candlemas." In 1347 David was 
released, the ransom being fixed at 100,000 marks. He 
made many after-visits to England, and proposed to the 
Estates, that Lionel, the second son of Edward, should 
succeed him, but to this they would not agree. He died in 
1370, and left no children. After the death of Joan he had 
married Margaret Logie, a woman of obscure birth. 

10. Robert II., 1370-1390. — David was succeeded by his 
sister's son, Robert, the Steward of the kingdom. This 
office was hereditary, and it gradually passed into the sur~ 
name < of the family who held it and became common to 
the different branches. The stewardship was first granted 
to Walter Fitz-Alan, a Breton baron, by David. Robert 
was allowed to mount the throne unopposed. It had been 
feared that William Lord Douglas, who through his mother, 
a sister of the Red Comyn, represented the claim that had 
been resigned by the Balliols, would have disputed his right 
to the throne, but he did not. Robert was twice married. 
His first wife was Elizabeth More, by whom he had four 
sons and several daughters. After her death he married 
Enphemia, daughter of the Earl of Ross, and had two 
sons and four daughters. The descendants of this second 
marriage claimed the crown on the ground that the dis- 
pensation from Rome had not been obtained, which, as 
Robert and Elizabeth were near of kin, was needful to make 
the marriage valid, and the children legitimate. Dispensa- 
tions for each marriage have since been discovered, which 
decide the right of Robert's first family. 

11. The French Allies. — At the end of the truce with 






60 THE INDEPENDENT KINGDOM. [chap. 

England, in 1385, war broke out again. The French sent a 
body of 2,000 men, 1,000 stands of armour, and 50,000 gold 
pieces to the aid of their allies the Scots. Sir John de Vienne, 
Admiral of France, was the leader of the French auxiliaries. 
Richard the Second of England, with an army of 70,000 men, 
invaded Scotland, and marched as far north as the Fo?'th. 
But the country had been wasted before him, so that the only 
harm he could do was to destroy Melrose Abbey. Meanwhile 
the Scots had harried the northern counties of his own 
kingdom with their French allies. The French afterwards 
said that in the dioceses of Carlisle and Durham they had 
burned more than the value of all the towns in Scotland. 
But the Frenchmen despised the poverty of the Scots, and 
were disgusted with their way of fighting; and as the Scots 
in return were uncivil and inhospitable to them, they went 
away before long, and were as glad to get back to their 
own land as the Scots were to get rid of them. 

12. Raid of Otterburn. — A few years later the Scots 
barons made another raid on the north of England. An 
army 5,000 strong mustered at Jedburgh. By the capture of 
an English spy, they learned that the English meant to keep 
out of their way, and, while they entered England, to make a 
counter-raid on the south of Scotland. To defeat this plan 
the Scots parted their force into two bands, one of which 
was to enter England on the east, the other on the west. 
The eastern division, under the Earls of Douglas, Dunbar, 
and Moray, swept the country as far as Durham. As they 
were returning laden with spoil, they tarried three days 
near Newcastle, where were gathered the English barons 
under Ralph and Henry Percy, sons of the Earl of North- 
humberland, the Warden of the Marches. Many skir- 
mishes then took place between the two forces. In one of 
these Douglas took the pennon of Sir Henry Percy, sur- 
named Hotspur, and challenged him to come to his tent 



IV.] ROBERT THE THIRD. 6 1 

and win it back. The next day the Scots moved off and 
encamped near Otterbum Tower. Percy hurried after them 
and attacked them in the night. The Scots, though fewer 
in number, had the advantage of being in a well-defended 
camp. They won the day, but the victory was dearly bought, 
for Douglas was slain in the fight. This battle, in which 
many lives were lost without any real cause, and without 
dcing any good whatever, was reckoned one of the best 
fought battles of that warlike time. It was all hand to hand 
fighting, and all the knights engaged in it on both sides 
showed great valour. Their feats of arms have been com- 
memorated in the spirit-stirring ballad of Chevy Chase. The 
Scots came back to their own land, bringing with them 
Hotspur and more than forty English knights whom they 
had taken prisoners. This fight, which was called the Raid 
of Otterburn, took place in August 1388. 

Robert died in 1390. He left the country at peace ; for a 
truce between England and France, taking in Scotland as 
an ally of the latter, had been made the year before. 

13. Robert III., 1390-1406. — The eldest son of the late 
King was John, but, as Balliol had made this name odious to 
the people, he changed it at his coronation to Robert. The 
country was in a miserable state. The nobles had been so 
long used to war with England that they could not bear 
to be at peace. They fought with one another, and preyed 
on the peasants and burghers. As the King was too weak 
both in mind and body to restrain them, the Estates placed 
the sovereign power in the hands of his son David, who was 
created Duke of Rothesay. This is the first time the title of 
Duke appears in Scottish history. Rothesay was to act as 
the King's Lieutenant for three years, with the advice of a 
council chosen by the Estates. Meanwhile the real rulers 
were the King's two brothers, Robert, Duke of Albany, and 
Alexander, Earl of Buchan, who was master of the country 



62 THE INDEPENDENT KINGDOM. [chap. 

north of the Firths, where his ferocity won him the surname 
of the Wolf of Badenoch. Albany, anxious, as he gave out, 
to restrain the wild follies of his nephew Rothesay, seized 
him and confined him in Falkland Castle. There he died. 
Albany said that he had died from natural causes, but the 
people believed that he had been starved by his uncle. After 
his death, Albany, with his associate Archibald, Earl of 
Douglas, was cleared of suspicion by an act of the Estates. 
He was afterwards appointed Governor. 

14. Clan Battle near Perth. — During this reign there was 
a deadly combat between two bands of Highlanders on 
a meadow by the Tay, called the North Inch of Perth. 
The King and his nobles, and a vast crowd of persons of 
all ranks, gathered to see them fight. There were thirty 
chosen men on each side, and they fought as was their wont, 
with axes, swords, or bows, and wore no armour. Before 
the fight began one man left the ranks, swam the Tay, 
and fled. One Henry Wynd, called " Gow Chrom," or the 
" Crooked Smith," was hired to fill his place. They fought 
with fury, and did not leave off till ten men, all wounded, 
were left on the one side, and one only upon the other. 
Gow Chrom did such good service that he is said to have 
won the victory for the clan that had enlisted his services, 
though it is said he knew so little about the matter that 
he was quite uncertain which side he was fighting for. Like 
Otterburn, this slaughter simply showed the skill of the 
combatants in killing one another. The name of the clans 
engaged, and their cause of quarrel, if they had any, have 
been alike forgotten. 

15. Relations with England. — In 14PO, soon after the end 
of the truce, Henry the Fourth, who by a revolution had been 
placed on his cousin Richard's throne, revived the old claim 
over Scotland in order to make himself popular with the 
English. He announced his intention of coming to Edin- 



iv.] ALBANY'S REGENCY. 63 

burgh to receive the homage of the King and of the nobles, 
and to enforce his demand he marched as far as Leith at the 
head of an army. This was the most harmless invasion on 
record, for, as usual, the Scots had got out of the way, and 
the English had to retreat without finding an enemy to fight 
with. About this time George of Dunbar, Eari of March, 
shifted his allegiance to Henry. He was offended because 
Rothesay married a daughter of his great rival Douglas, 
instead of his own daughter Elizabeth, to whom he was 
betrothed. In 1402 he joined Sir Henry Percy, surnamed 
Hotspur, and defeated an invading body of the Scots under 
Douglas at Homildon. This was much such an affair as 
Otterbm'n, only this time the English won and Douglas was 
taken prisoner. He afterwards joined the Percies in their 
rebellion against Henry and fought with them at Shrewsbury. 
Albany had an army on the Border ready to help the rebels, 
but their defeat and dispersion brought his plan to nothing. 
But Albany hit on another way of threatening Henry. He 
entertained at the Scottish court a person whom he received 
as the dethroned Richard, who had been discovered in dis- 
guise, so the story ran, a fugitive in the Western Isles. In 
1405, however, chance threw into Henry's hands an impor- 
tant prize. This was fames, Earl of Carrick, second son of 
the King, and heir to the throne. He was captured by 
the English, in time of truce, while on his way to France, 
whither he was sent, nominally to be educated, but really 
to be out of the reach of his dangerous uncle. Thus, as 
the head of each government had a hostage for the good 
behaviour of the other, there was no open war between the 
two nations. In 1406 Robert died. 

16. Albany's Regency- — The death of Robert made no 
change in the government, though the young King was ac- 
knowledged as James the First. There was nominal peace 
with England, but the work of winning back the Border 



64 THE INDEPENDENT KINGDOM. [chap. 

strongholds still went on. Jedburgh was retaken and de- 
stroyed, as the best means of securing it against foreign 
occupation in future. 

17. Battle of Harlaw. — The kingdom was now threat- 
ened on the other border, the northern march which 
parted the Saxons of the north-eastern Lowlands from the 
Celtic clans of the mountains. The hatred between the 
hostile races had been growing more and more bitter, and 
was fostered by constant inroads on the one hand and cruel 
laws upon the other. The time seemed now to have come 
when there must be a trial of strength between them. The 
head of the Celts was Donald, Lord of the Isles, who, though 
he had sworn fealty to David the Second, again claimed 
sovereign power over all the clans of the West, and entered 
into treaties with England as though he had been an inde- 
pendent monarch. He claimed the Earldom of Ross in 
right of his wife, as her niece, the heiress, had taken 
the veil. By getting this earldom, the Lord of the Isles 
became lord over half the kingdom, and he resolved to 
invade the territory of the King, whom he looked on as 
a rival. Now the district that lay nearest him, the Low- 
lands north of the Forth, as it had not been touched by 
the Border wars, was at this time at once the richest part 
of the kingdom and the part least accustomed to self- 
defence. Great therefore was the terror of the burghers 
and husbandmen at the news that a horde of plundering 
savages would soon be let loose upon them. They took 
up arms in their own defence, and they were fortunate in 
finding a leader whose experience, gained in similar warfare 
on his own account, well fitted him to withstand the ambitious 
Donald. This was Alexander Stewart, Earl of Mar, the 
illegitimate son of the Wolf of Badenoch. He had won his 
reputation by valour in the French wars, and his earldom by 
carrying off and marrying an heiress, who was Countess of 



iv.] SCOTS IN FRANCE. 



65 



Mar in her own right. The rival races met at Harlaw, in 
Aberdeenshire, July 24, 141 1. Here, as at Bannockburn, the 
determination and stedfastness of each man in the smaller 
force decided the fortune of the day. For, though the High- 
landers, reckless of life, charged again and again, they made 
no impression on the small compact mass that kept the way 
against them, and they were at last forced to retreat. This 
battle was justly looked on as a great national deliverance, 
greater even than the victory at Bannockburn, and many 
privileges and immunities were granted to the heirs of those 
who had fallen. 

18. The Scots in France.— During the Regency the Scots 
did good service to their old allies of France, who were sorely 
pressed by the English. Henry the Fifth of England 
had conquered nearly all France, and had been proclaimed 
heir of the French king. A company of 700 Scots, led by 
John Stewart, Earl of Buchan, second son of Albany, went 
to the help of the French. They arrived safely in France, 
in spite of the careful watch upon the seas kept up by 
the English in order to prevent them. By their aid the 
French gained their first victory in this war at the battle 
of Beauge in 142 1. Buchan was made Constable of 
France. He was then sent back to Scotland on an embassy 
to seek the help of Douglas on the part of the King of 
France. An alliance was made between them in 1423, 
and Douglas came to France, where the rich Duchy of Tou- 
raine and many other lands were conferred upon him. But 
Douglas was slain not long after at the battle of Verneuil in 
1424. Most of the Scots fell with him, for the English re- 
fused them quarter, as Henry had James of Scotland in his 
camp, and he gave orders that all the Scots bearing arms on 
the French side should be looked upon as traitors fighting 
against their King. The remnant that were left were formed 
into a royal body-guard, the beginning of the famous Scots 
M F 



66 THE INDEPENDENT KINGDOM. [chap 

Guard of the French kings. Archibald, Earl of Douglas, 
who fell at Verneuil, was called " Tine-man" or lose-man, 
because in every battle in which he took part he fought on 
the losing side. 

19. Death of Albany. — Albany died in 141 9. His son A fur- 
dock succeeded him as Governor, but there is no record of his 
being confirmed in that office by the Estates. As he had not 
the talents of his father, he had no control over the barons. 
Every man was his own master, and the land was filled with 
violence. The obvious remedy was to bring home the King, 
and Douglas and some of the other nobles treated with the 
English government for his release. 

20. Summary. — Under the immediate successors of 
Robert the First, Scotland nearly lost all the advantages 
which he had won for her. The country was torn by civil 
strife ; the kings were weak and useless ; the nobles became 
so strong and overbearing that their power more than equalled 
that of the Crown, and they set at nought the King's au- 
thority. All social improvement was at a standstill. Still 
we find during this period the first stirrings of a desire 
for increase of knowledge and greater liberty of religious 
thought. Two events mark this: the burning of John 
Reseby, with his books, on a charge of heresy, at Perth in 
1408 ; and the opening of the first University in Scotland, 
founded at St. Andrews by Henry Wardlaw, the bishop, 
in 1410. The history of Scotland was now first written by 
two natives of the country ; John of Forditn, who wrote 
the " Scotichronicon? and Andrew Wyntoun, who wrote 
a metrical chronicle. 



v.] JAMES THE FIRST. 67 

CHAPTER V. 

THE JAMESES. 

Return of the King (1)— state of the Highlands (2)— murder of 
James (3) — judicial reforms (4) — James II. (5) — Crichton 
and Livingstone {6)— the Douglases (7)— majority of James ; 
fall of Douglas (8)— siege of Roxburgh (9)— James III. (10)— 
Orkney and Shetland (11)— relations with England (12) — revolt 
of the nobles (13) — battle of Sauchieburn (14) — Church matters 
(15)— James IV. (id) — English intrigues (17) — state of the 
Highlands (18) — differences with England (19) — battle of 
Flodden (20)— state of the Church (21)— James V. (22)— Albany's 
regency (23)— English interference (24)— the "Erection" (25) — 
fall of Angus (26)— internal affairs (27)— English war (28)— 
M 0/ James ; his character {29)— Mary (30)— treaties with 
England {31)— first English invasion (32) — second English 
invasion (33)— third English invasion ; fight at Pinkie (34) — 
internal affairs (35)— Regency of Mary of Lorraine; first mar- 
riage of Mary Stewart (36)— social progress (37)— slate of editca- 
tion and literature (38) — summary (39). 

I. James I., 1424-1436. Return of the King.— In 1424 James 
came home and brought with him his English wife, Joan, 
daughter of the Earl of Somerset. As he had been taken in 
time of peace, a ransom could not decently be demanded, 
but the Scots were required to pay forty thousand pounds 
to defray the expenses of his eighteen years' maintenance 
and education. The King, now at last restored to his 
kingdom, let eight months pass quietly before taking ven- 
geance on those who had so long kept him out of it. He 
spent this time in winning the confidence of the people and 
of the lesser barons. He then seized Albany, his two sons, 
and twenty-six other nobles at Perth, whither they had come 

F 2 






68 7 HE JAMESES. [chap. 

to attend the Parliament. Albany and his two sons were tried 
before a jury of twenty- one peers, many of whom sat only to 
secure their own safety. They were found guilty of treason 
and put to death at Stirling. James himself presided at. 
the trial, thereby reviving the ancient practice of the King's 
personal administration of justice. 

2. The Highlands. — When James had thus got rid of his 
dangerous cousins, he turned his attention to the Highlands 
and Western Isles, which presented a strange mixture of 
Celtic and of feudal manners. They were ruled partly by 
Norman barons, and partly by native chiefs, and these 
barons or chiefs were both alike upheld by that personal 
devotion of their vassals which was the strong point of 
Celtic clanship. James summoned the chiefs to a par- 
liament at Inverness in 1427. They obeyed the summons, 
and were at once seized and imprisoned. Three of them were 
hanged at that time. Several others shared the same fate 
at a later date. Others were imprisoned, and a small 
remnant only allowed to go away unhurt. Alexander, Lord 
of the Isles, was among these last, and the first use he made 
of his recovered liberty was to bring his islemen down on 
Inverness, which they destroyed. James hurried northward 
again and defeated him in Lochaber. Alexander gave himself 
up to the King's grace, and was confined in Tantalion Castle. 
But his kinsman, Donald Balloch, set himself at the head of 
the clans and they defeated the royal army. James deter- 
mined to crush the Celts once and for ever. An additional 
tax was levied for the purpose, and James set out once more 
for the north. But the chiefs, who saw that the King was 
just then too strong for them, met him with proffers of hom- 
age and submission. Such submissions were, however, prac- 
tically worthless. In the eyes of the Celts they were just 
as little binding as the parchment title-deeds by which the 
government sought to change their chiefs into feudal barons. 



v.] JUDICIAL REFORMS. 69 



3. Murder of James. — The policy of James was to reduce 
the power of the baronage, and to balance it by strengthening 
the clergy and encouraging the commons. He made strict 
search into the titles by which the several nobles held their 
lands, and more especially into the actual state of the estates 
which had been held by the Crown in the time of Robert 
the First. He deprived the Earl of March of his earldom, 
on the ground that Albany, who had restored it to him, 
had not the power to confer upon him the estates which 
he had once forfeited by the transfer of his allegiance to 
England. James also took from Malise Grahame his earl- 
dom of Stratheam, which he had inherited through his 
mother, on the ground that it was a male fief. He therefore 
transferred it to the next male heir, Walter Stewart, Earl 
of A thole, grand-uncle of Grahame, the only surviving son of 
Robert the Second. These measures roused the dislike and 
distrust of the class they were aimed at, and a conspiracy 
was formed against the King. At its head was Sir Robert 
Grahame, uncle of Malise, who had been banished for de- 
nouncing the King's doings in Parliament. Through the 
connivance of the Earl of Athole, the High Chamberlain, the 
conspirators got entrance to the King's quarters, when he 
was keeping his Christmas in the monastery of the Black 
Friars at Perth, and there they treacherously murdered him, 
1436. James left one son and five daughters. Margaret, 
the eldest, was married to the Dauphin, afterwards Louis 
the Eleventh of France. 

4. Judicial Reforms. — James held many parliaments, and 
pretty nearly all are noteworthy for passing wise measures 
for the common good. In his first parliament, the " Com- 
mittee of the Articles',' which dated from the reign of David 
the Second, was acknowledged as an established part of the 
parliament. This committee was elected by the parliament 
at the beginning of its session, and nearly the whole power 






70 THE JAMESES. [chap. 

of the Estates was made over to the persons chosen to form 
it, who were called the Lords of the Articles. They con- 
sulted together and considered the Articles presented to 
them in parliament, which were then passed by the vote of 
the Estates and became law. This custom, by which the 
business of the whole parliament was left in the hands of 
a committee, was afterwards found to be the weakest point 
of the legislature, and paved the way for a great deal of 
bribery and corruption. Statute law in Scotland dates from 
this reign, as it was James who first caused a collection of 
statutes to be made, and separated those that were still in 
force from those that had fallen out of use. He also regulated 
weights and measures, and fixed a standard for the coinage, 
so that it should be of the same weight and fineness as the 
money in England. From his reign also dates the appoint- 
ment of the office of Treasurer j the publication of the acts 
of parliament in the language spoken by the people ; the 
first effort towards the representation of the lesser barons by 
commissaries ; and an attempt to establish a supreme court 
of civil jurisdiction, which was to consist of the Chan- 
cellor and three other persons chosen by the Estates, 
and to sit three times a year. In order that the Scottish 
people might learn to compete with the English bowmen, 
James established schools in the different parishes for the 
practice of archery. In short, he strove in every way to 
make his people profit by what he had learnt and observed 
during his long exile in England. He was a patron of 
learning, and was himself a scholar and one of the earliest 
and best English poets. The longest of his poems is called 
the " King's Quhair" or book. In it he sang his love for 
his fair English bride in strains that prove him to have been 
a true poet. It is written in stanzas of seven lines each, 
a very favourite measure in those days, which was after- 
wards called the "roial rime" in memory of this poet-king. 



v.] JAMES THE SECOND. 71 

5. James II., 1436-1460. — The young King, who was only- 
six years old when his father was killed, was crowned at 
Holyrood, as Scone, the customary crowning-place, was too 
near the Highlands, where the conspirators had taken 
refuge, to be safe. He was then taken by his mother for 
greater security to Edinbui'gh Castle. The object of the 
murderers was to place on the throne the Earl of Athole, 
who, as being the son of the second marriage of Robert 
the Second, was looked on as the true heir by the party 
who held that the first marriage of that king was not valid. 
If this were their design, it was not seconded by the people, 
who were filled with sorrow and anger at the death of the 
King, who had made himself popular by all the good he 
had done for them. A hue-and-cry was raised after the 
murderers, who were taken and put to death with cruel 
tortures. 

6. Crichton and Livingstone. — The first part of the reign 
was a struggle for the wardship of the King's person, which 
gave nearly royal power to whoever held it. The rivals for 
this honour were William Crichton, the Chancellor and 
governor of Edinburgh Castle; Alexander Livingstone, the 
governor of Stirling, the other great stronghold ; and the 
Queen-mother. The Queen, who feared that Crichton would 
try to separate the young King from her if she stayed in 
Edinburgh, succeeded in getting herself and her child out 
of his hands by a stealthy flight to Stirling. But she soon 
found that they had only changed jailers, for Livingstone 
kept as strict a guard over the King as Crichton had done. 
A few years later she married Stewart, Lord of Loriu, after 
which she took no further part in public affairs. Her flight 
to Stirling gave Livingstone for a time the advantage in the 
possession of the King, till Crichton contrived to kidnap 
him back to Edinburgh. But as the rivals found that it 
would be more for the interest of each to act in concert 



72 THE JAMESES. [chap. 

with the other, they made an agreement, by which James 
was sent back to the custody of Livingstone. 

7. The House of Douglas. — Archibald, Ea?'l of Douglas, 
was at this time the most powerful baron in Scotland. Be- 
sides holding Galloway, Annandale, and other great estates in 
Scotland, he had inherited the Duchy ofTouraine, which had 
been conferred on his father by the King of France for good 
service done against the English, and in his foreign duchy 
he possessed wealth and splendour beyond anything that the 
Scottish king could boast. The family still had a hold 
on the popular favour won for them by the Good Lord 
James. They had also some pretensions to the crown of 
Scotland, for Archibald, brother and heir of the Good Lord 
James, had married a sister of the Red Corny 11, who was 
slain by Bruce. The Douglases therefore represented the 
claim of the Comyns, which, as we have seen, was better than 
that of Bruce. They were also descendants of Robert the 
Second, through Eitphetnia, one of the children of his second 
marriage, to whom those who looked on his first family 
as illegitimate held that the crown ought to have gone. 
Douglas had been chosen Lieutenant-Governor of the king- 
dom, and had ample power to quiet the rival parties had he 
chosen to exercise it. But he did not, and his nominal govern- 
ment was ended by his death in 1439. William, his son, who 
at seventeen succeeded to all this pride and power, kept up a 
state and retinue almost royal, and much violence and oppres- 
sion were laid to his charge. Crichton and Livingstone agreed 
to compass his downfall, and for this end they invited him 
and his brother David to visit the King at Edinburgh. They 
came, were seized, and, after the form of a trial, were beheaded 
in the Castle-yard. The power of their house was thus 
broken for a time. The estates were divided ; part went with 
the title to their grand-uncle James, the male heir, while 
Galloway went to their sister Margaret. But on the death 



v.] THE DOUGLASES. 73 

of James they were re-united, for his son William married 
Margaret of Galloway, his cousin. He then went to court, 
to do his duty, as he said, to his sovereign, pretended that 
the King had chosen him Lieutenant-General of the kingdom, 
and got most of the power into his own hands. He and 
Livingstone joined, and tried to make Crichton give up the 
seals by besieging him in Edinburgh Castle ; but he held 
out so well that they were forced to make terms with him. 
Douglas grew more proud and powerful every year. He 
was already lord of nearly all the southern country, and he 
joined in a bond with the great chiefs of the north, — the Lord 
of the Lsles, who was now Earl of Ross, and Alexander, Earl 
of Crawford, the head of the house of Lindsay and repre- 
sentative of the fallen Earls of March. He held meetings 
of his vassals, to which he summoned all those who either 
were or, as he thought, ought to be his dependants. Nor did 
he scruple to put to death any who opposed him, in direct 
defiance of the King's commands. But as the Earl's retainers 
nurhbered 5,000, while the King had not so much as a body- 
guard, his commands were not easily enforced. On one oc- 
casion the King sent Sir Patrick Gray to demand the release 
of his nephew, M'Lcllan, tutor or guardian of the young 
Laird of Bunby, or Bomby, whom Douglas had put in ward 
because he failed to appear at one of the gatherings of his 
vassals. Douglas received him courteously, but said he 
could on no account hear the King's message till his visitor 
had dined. Meanwhile he had the prisoner brought out and 
beheaded. When he heard the King's order he feigned great 
respect for it, and, showing the body, said, " There lies your 
sister's son ; he wants the head, but the body is at your 
service." Sir Patrick had to hide his anger as best he 
might till he had got safe out of his hands. 

8. Majority of James. Fall of Douglas. — The King's 
majority was soon followed by the ruin of Livingstone. 



74 THE JAMESES. [chap. 

Douglas was too strong to be openly attacked. He was 
invited to .Stirling and received in a friendly way. James 
remonstrated with him about the bonds, and urged him to 
break them off. Douglas refused. James in a fit of passion 
cried out, " If you will not break the bonds, this shall/ 1 and 
stabbed him. Sir Patrick Gray, who stood by, killed him with 
his pole-axe. They then threw the mangled body into the 
courtyard. This savage deed plunged the whole country 
into civil war. James, the brother and heir of the mur- 
dered Earl, openly defied the King ; that is, he renounced 
his allegiance to him as a traitor and a perjured man. His 
cause was taken up by the parties to the bond, the Earls 
of R\ .v and Crawford. The King, who felt himself too weak 
to break the confederacy, was forced to turn to his own 
advantage the enmity among his nobles, and to pull down 
one house by building up another. This policy only changed 
the name of the rivals of the Crown, without getting rid of 
them, and it laid the foundation of the like troubles in future 
reigns. In the north James entrusted the conduct of the war 
to the head of the house of Gordon, whom he created Earl oj 
J I untly, and whose lands lay between those of the banded 
Earls. In the south the Earl of Angus, the head of the Red 
Douglases as they were called, was made use of to overthrow 
the Black Douglases, the elder branch of the family. The 
question whether James Stewart or James Douglas should 
wear the crown was settled by a battle at Arkinholm, in Esk- 
dale, in 1454. Douglas was forsaken by many of his followers, 
and w is defeated and fled to England. An act of forfeiture 
was passed against him and all his house, and, to prevent any 
one family again becoming so formidable, another act was 
d, which made Galloway and certain other lordships 
and castles inalienable from the Crown. But, in spite of this, 
the greater part of the lands of the fallen Douglas went to his 
kinsman Angus. Many other families also, among them the 



v.] JAMES THE THIRD. 75 

Hamiltotis, rose from the ruins of the Black Douglases. 
Sir James Hamilton, the head of the house, had been one 
of the adherents of the Earl, but he deserted to the ro; ' 
side on the eve of the battle of Arkinholm. 

9. Siege of Roxburgh.— As the strife which was at this 
time going on between the Yorkists and Lancastrians kept 
the English busy at home, there was comparative peace on 
the Border, broken only by an inroad from Percy and the 
banished Douglas. James took the part of Henry VI., and 
raised a large army with the intention of invading England 
in his favour. But there was no serious war, and James saw 
that there was now a good chance of winning back the towns 
which the English still held in Scotland. He therefore laid 
siege to Roxburgh, and was killed there by the bursting of a 
large cannon which he was watching with great interest. 
After his death the Queen urged on the siege, and Roxburgh 
was taken and destroyed. This siege is noteworthy as being 
among the first in which we hear of the use of artillery in 
Scotland. Another notable feature of it was the presence 
of the Lord of the Isles with an auxiliary force, for which 
service he was made one of the Wardens of the Border. 
James had married Mary, the daughter of the Duke of 
Gelders, and left four sons, the eldest only eight years old. 
The second university in Scotland was founded in this 
reign, at Glasgow, by Bishop Turnbull. 

10. James III., 1460-1488. — During the first part of this 
reign, Kennedy, Bishop of St. Andrews, had the chief part in 
the government. He died in 1466, and on his death the 
Boyds got hold of the King and of the chief power. These 
Boyds were originally simple lairds, but they strengthened 
themselves by bonds with more powerful families, won the 
King's favour and finally got possession of his person, by 
making him come with them, partly by persuasion, partly 
by force, from Stirling to Edinburgh. They then obtained 



76 THE JAMESES. [chap. 

an act of the Estates declaring that this step had been 
taken with the full consent and good pleasure of the King. 
The Lord Boyd was appointed guardian of his person and 
of the royal strongholds, his son Thomas was created Earl 
of Arra?i, and with the earldom the King's sister Mary was 
given him in marriage. 

1 1. Annexation of Orkney and Shetland. — For many years 
the rent of the Western Isles had not been paid to the King 
of Norway. There were heavy arrears due to him which 
had been demanded in the last reign. It was now agreed to 
settle the matter peaceably by the marriage of James with 
Margaret, daughter of Christian of Norway, in 1469. Her 
dowry was the claim for the arrears and 60,000 florins, in 
security for which the Orkney and Shetland Isles were 
placed as pledges in the hands of the King of Scotland. 
These islands have never been redeemed by payment of 
the sum agreed on. Arran had been chiefly concerned 
in bringing about this marriage. During his absence 
at the court of Christian his enemies were busy in com- 
passing his fall. His wife sent him timely warning of 
his danger, and he fled first to Denmark and finally to 
England, whither his father had also escaped. But Alex- 
ander, the younger son, was made the scapegoat for the sins 
of his kindred. He was seized, tried, and put to death 
for his share in kidnapping the King, which was now de- 
nounced as treason. The family estates were forfeited, and 
most of them were declared inalienable from the Crown. 

12. Relations with England.— In the beginning of the 
reign, Edward the Fourth kept up a seeming show of 
friendliness, but he was secretly treating with Douglas and 
the Lord of the Isles to the effect that they should hold the 
two paits of Scotland as principalities dependent on Eng- 
land. The end of this underhand dealing was that John, 
son of the Lord of the Isles, invaded and wasted the district 



v.] REVOLT OF THE NOBLES. 77 

that was to be his principality, all the country north of the 
Scots Water. This led to the final breaking up of the lord- 
ship of the Isles, for he was called to account for his rebellion, 
and was required to resign the districts of Knapdale and 
Kintyre, the original Scottish kingdom ; the sheriffdoms of 
Inverness and Nairn, and the earldom of Ross, which was 
vested in the Crown. In exchange for his proud but doubtful 
title of Lord of the Isles, he was made at peer of parliament. 
In 1474 a marriage was arranged between Edward's daughter 
Cecily and James the Prince of Scotland. It was broken off 
owing to a quarrel between the King and his brothers, Alex- 
ander Duke of Albany, and John Earl of Mar. They were 
much more popular than James, and, when Mar died sud- 
denly in Craigmillar Castle, James was suspected of having 
poisoned him. Albany was arrested and confined in Edin- 
burgh Castle on a charge of treasonable dealings with 
Edward. He escaped to France in hopes of getting Louis 
the Eleventh to take his part, but he found a more willing 
helper in Edward. An agreement was made that Edward 
should place Albany on the throne of Scotland, that he 
should hold it, and that he should marry the Lady Cecily. 
After divers threatening messages had been exchanged be- 
tween the two governments, and many threatenings of attack 
had been made, a great Scottish army was mustered to 
invade England in good earnest. 

13. Revolt of the Nobles. — The King had always been 
unpopular with his nobles. His love of money and of peace- 
able pursuits found little sympathy with them, and they 
could neither understand nor tolerate his fancy for making 
favourites of men whom they despised. The time had 
now come when they could take the law into their own 
hands. The army raised for the invasion of England was 
led by the King in person, and advanced as far as Lauder 
in Berwickshire. There the nobles met together, with old 



78 THE JAMESES. [chap. 

Angus at their head, to devise some way of getting rid 
of the most hated of these favourites. This was Robert 
Cochrane, a mason or architect, to whom the King had 
given the control of the artillery in this expedition. He had 
also conferred on him the revenues of the earldom of Mar, 
and Cochrane, going a step further, had assumed the title. 
While they were deliberating, the Lord Gray, so the story 
goes, quoted the old fable of the mice and the cat, meaning 
thereby that all their talk would come to nothing unless 
one of their number was bold enough to attack their enemy. 
On this Archibald Earl of Angus cried out, " Heed not, 
I'll bell the cat." This saying won him the nickname 
of " Bell the Cat." While they thus sat in council in 
the church, Cochrane himself knocked at the door and de- 
manded admittance in the name of the King. The finery 
which he wore, the chain of massive gold thrown round 
his neck, the jewelled horn that dangled from it, the gilt 
helmet borne before him, still further heated the wrath of 
the lords. They seized him, and with many insults accused 
him of misguiding the King and the government. Meanwhile 
they had sent a band of armed men to the King's tent to 
secure Rogers, a musician, and the other favourites. They 
then hanged them all over Lauder Bridge. John Ramsay 
of Balmain was the only one of the favourites who was 
spared to the entreaties of the King. The triumphant barons 
then brought the King back to Edinburgh, 1482. Soon after 
this Albany came back, and demanded the release of his 
brother, and for a short time they lived together seemingly 
on good terms, while Albany really ruled. But before long 
he found it most prudent to return to England, and he 
showed his real designs by putting Dunbar Castle into the 
hands of the English. 

14. Battle of Sauchieburn. — The King, who had not 
learned wisdom by the lesson of Lauder Bridge, grew more 



v.] JAMES THE FOURTH. 79 

and more unpopular. A confederacy was formed, and a large 
army was raised by the lords south of the Forth. To give 
a show of justice to their doings, they placed James the 
Prince of Scotland at their head, professing to have deposed 
his father, and to have accepted him as their lawful king. 
North of the Scots Water the country was true to James, and 
there he collected a considerable force. The two armies met 
at Sauchieburn. The King, who was not brave, turned and 
fled at the first sign that the day was going against him. 
In his flight he was thrown from his horse and carried to 
a mill built on the Bannock Burn, where he was murdered 
by an unknown hand, 1488. 

15. Church Matters. — In 147 1 St. A ndrews was raised to 
an Archbishopric. Pope Sextus the Fourth sent the pallium 
to Robert Graham the bishop, but this increase of dignity only 
proved a source of torment to him, for his suffragans, out of 
jealousy, accused him of all manner of heresies and crimes. 
He was deposed and degraded, and ended his days in con- 
finement. 

16. James IV., 1488-1513. — The first thing to be done after 
the affair of Sauchieburn was to find out what had become of 
the King, and, when his death was made sure of, an inquiry 
was set on foot as to the cause of it. The offices of state 
were transferred to the party in power, and an act of amnesty 
was passed, to take in all persons who had taken part with 
the late King in the struggle which the nobles pleased to 
call the late rebellion. Two ineffectual risings to avenge 
the murder of the King were made by the Lords Lennox 
and Forbes, and three years later, to pacify the clamours 
of the people, a reward of one hundred marks was offered 
for the discovery of the actual murderers. 

17. English Intrigues. — Just at this time Henry the 
Seventh of England had his hands too busy at home to 
allow of his making open war upon Scotland, but he car- 



80 THE JAMESES. [chap. 

ried on secret schemes with Aligns, Ramsay, and others 
for the capture of the King. James, on the other hand, 
upheld that Perkin Warbeck was really Richard, Duke of 
York, received him at his court as the son of King 
Edward, and gave him in marriage his kinswoman Laay 
Katharine Gordon. A force of French and Burgundians 
came to aid him, and an army crossed the Border, but it 
did nothing, as the rising which had been planned, and 
was to have been made at the same time in the north of 
England, did not take place. At last James got tired of 
Perkin, sent him off to Ireland, though with a princely escort, 
and renewed a truce with Henry, in 1497. The two kings 
were drawn still closer by the marriage of James with 
Margaret Tudor, eldest daughter of Henry, in 1502. 

18. State of the Highlands.— James paid frequent visits to 
Kintyre, the Isles, and Inverness, and took measures for the 
building of more castles and the maintenance of garrisons in 
those already built. This plan might have been successful 
in keeping the country quiet, if the Crown had been strong 
enough to carry it out. As it was not, James was forced to 
fall back on the old policy of turning the feuds of the chiefs 
to their own destruction, by empowering one to act against 
another. Again the Gordons got a great increase of power, 
for their head, the Earl of Huntly, was appointed sheriff of 
Inverness, Ross, and Caithness, with the condition that he 
should finish and maintain a fortress at Inverness. In the west 
the charge of keeping order was put into the hands of the Earl 
of Argyle, the chief of the Campbells. An attempt was also 
made to break up the Isles into sheriffdoms, and to impose 
upon the Highlanders the laws of the Lowlands. A com- 
mission was issued for the banishment of broken men, as those 
clansmen were called who had no representative chiefs, and 
an Act was passed which made the chiefs responsible for 
the execution of legal writs upon their clansmen. But the 



v.] BATTLE OF FLODDEN. 8l 

disaffected chiefs rallied round Donald Dhu, an illegitimate 
descendant of the last Lord of the Lsles, and it took three 
years' fighting on the part of the King and of Huntly to 
reduce them. Donald 'was at last brought captive to Edin- 
burgh, and the lordship of the Isles was finally broken up 
in 1504. 

19. Differences with England. — In this reign Scotland first 
appears as a naval power, and this proved a new source of strife 
with England. One of the King of Scots' captains, A?id?'ew 
Barton, bore letters of marque against the Portuguese, but the 
English accused him of taking English vessels also. He was 
attacked in time of truce by the Howards. He himself was 
killed in the action, and his ship, the Lion, was taken, and 
became the second ship in the English navy. James had also 
another cause of complaint against Henry the Eighth, for 
Henry refused to give up to his sister Margaret a legacy of 
jewels left to her by her father. When therefore England 
and France declared war, Scotland stood by her old ally, the 
bond between them was drawn closer, the right of citizen- 
ship in France was extended to the Scots, and Qiceen Anne 
of France made an appeal to the chivalrous feeling of James 
by choosing him as her knight, and calling on him for assis- 
tance. James therefore fitted out a fleet of twenty-three 
vessels. Among them was a very large ship called the 
Great Michael, which was looked on as a masterpiece of 
shipbuilding. This fleet was put under the command of 
James Hamilton, Earl of Arran, with orders to sail for 
France. Instead of doing this, he stormed Carrickfergus, 
and what became of the ships was never clearly made out. 

20. Battle of Flodden. — James also determined to invad3 
England. Though the cause was not popular, the King was, 
and a large army was soon mustered. The King himself 
led the host across the Border, and encamped on the Till, 
but, as he would not take the advice of Angus and others 

M G 



82 THE JAMESES. [chap. 

who knew more of border fighting than he did, he mis- 
managed the whole affair. He idled away the time till his 
own army began to disperse and the English had time to 
gather ; then he let them cross the river unopposed, and finally 
eft his strong position on the hill to meet them hand to 
hand in the plain. The result was an utter defeat, and the 
King, who was more eager to display his own valour than to 
act the part of the general in command, was slain in the 
thickest of the fight. Twelve earls and thirteen barons fell 
round him, and every noble house in Scotland left some of 
its name on the fatal field of Flodden Sept. 9, 1513. The 
death of James the Fourth was deeply mourned, for his reign 
had been peaceable and prosperous. He was popular with 
the nobles, because he kept them round him, and freely 
spent his father's savings ; and with the commons, because 
of his rigorous maintenance of justice, his encouragement of 
commerce and agriculture, and his easy, kindly manners. 
James is described as middle-sized, handsome, and well- 
made. Besides Latin and several other foreign languages, 
he could speak the Irish or Gaelic, which was the native 
tongue of his western subjects. During his reign Scotland 
was more prosperous than it had been since the days of 
the last Alexander. Trade was flourishing and on the in- 
crease, and large quantities of wool, hides, and fish were 
exported to other countries. 

ai. Church Matters. — In 1492, at the petition of the Estates, 
the pallium was sent from Rome to Robert Blackadder, 
Bishop of Glasgow, with licence to bear the cross and all 
other archiepiscopal insignia. This led to bitter strife be- 
tween the two Archbishops, who referred their disputes to the 
Pope, to the great wrath of the Estates, who denounced and 
forbade all such appeals to Rome. The burning of Reseby had 
not put a stop to the spreading of Wickliffe's doctrines, for 
we find thirty persons accused of the Lollard heresy by 



v.] JAMES THE FIFTH. 83 

Blackadcler. Two great steps towards the advancement of 
learning were made in this reign : the one was the founda- 
tion of a third University at Aberdeen, on the model of the 
University of Paris, by Elphinstone, the good Bishop of 
Aberdeen; the other was the introduction of the art of 
printing, by means of which knowledge could be extended 
to the people. The first press was set up by Walter CJcap- 
man, under the patronage of the King. 

22. James V., 1513-1542. — The news of the defeat at 
Flodden spread grief and terror through the country. The 
citizens of Edinburgh built a wall round their city, but its 
strength was not tried, for the English army dispersed 
instead of advancing. The Estates met at Perth, and the 
Queen-mother was appointed Regent, for the King was an 
infant only two years old. But within a year the Queen 
married Archibald, the young Earl of Angus, and the 
Estates then transferred the regency to John, Duke of 
Albany, High Admiral of France, son of the brother of 
James the Third. Peace was made with England, Scot- 
land being taken in as the ally of France in a treaty 
between that country and England. 

23. Albany's Regency. — Albany's government was at first 
very unpopular, for the national jealousy was roused by the 
number of his French followers. The Queen at first refused 
to give up the King, but she was besieged in Stirling Castle 
and obliged to yield. The country was distracted by the 
brawls of the two great factions, the Hamiltons and the 
Douglases. The Earl of Arran was the head of the former, 
Angus of the latter. The Governor put them down with the 
help of the French : Angus was seized and transported to 
France j his wife fled to Engla7id, where he contrived to join 
her before long. The Lord Home and his brother, two of 
the few survivors of Flodden, and the most powerful of the 
Angus faction, were seized at Edinburgh and beheaded, after 

G2 



84 THE JAMESES. [chap, 

the mere form of a trial. But Albany went back to France 
after he had been about a year in Scotland ; and as he left 
a Frenchman, Anthony de la Bastie, Warden of the Border, 
and placed the strongholds in the hands of the French also, 
the Scots grew more jealous and turbulent than before. De 
la Bastie fell a victim to the national hatred of foreigners. 
He was killed in a border raid by one of the Homes, in re- 
venge for the death of his kinsman, the Lord Home. The 
Celts in the west re-asserted their independence, and the feud 
between the Hamilto7is and the Douglases broke out worse 
than ever. They brought their brawls into the very streets 
of the capital. The Hamiltons laid a plan for attacking the 
Douglases, and making Angus prisoner. Gavin Douglas, 
Bishop of Dunkeld, fearing that his kinsmen might get the 
worst of it, appealed to James Beaton, the primate, to stop it. 
Beaton solemnly declared on his conscience that he knew 
nothing of the matter ; and to give weight to his words, laid 
his hand on his heart, and in so doing struck the breast- 
plate which he always wore. On this, Douglas, who heard 
the ring of the armour, told him that he heard his conscience 
"clattering," that is, telling tales. In the fight that followed, 
Angus so thoroughly routed his foes that the fray was called 
" Clear the Causeway" and after it he held the city with 
an armed force. Thus five years passed, and the Regent, 
who had nominally gone back to France for a few months 
only, was still absent, and it took a great deal of urging 
and threatening from the Estates to bring him back to 
his trust. 

24. English Interference. — It was now nine years since 
Flodden, and, as there had been peace with England during 
that time, the country had somewhat recovered her strength. 
When therefore Henry began to meddle in the affairs of Scot- 
land, to req"ire that Albany should be dismissed, and that the 
French connexion should be broken off, the Estates refused 



v.] THE "ERECTION." 85 

and prepared for war. As the greater part of the English 
force was in France, the northern counties of England were 
comparatively unprotected, and it was just the time for 
striking an effective blow there. Instead of doing this, Albany 
came to terms with Lord Dacre, the English Warden, and 
the large army that had gathered round him melted away 
without doing anything. But the truce was not renewed. 
Dacre stormed Jedburgh, and the Scots mustered again. 
This time their numbers were increased by the presence of 
some French auxiliaries whom Albany had brought back from 
France, to which he had paid a second visit. Again the army 
was brought to the Border without being led any further. By 
this time the Scots were thoroughly disgusted with Albany, 
and he with them ; and shortly after this second fruitless 
expedition, he sailed for France and took the Frenchmen 
with him, 1524. 

25. ''Erection" of the King.— No sooner was Albany 
gone than Henry, through his subtle chancellor Wolsey, 
tried to make the Scots break with France. Margaret, 
the Queen-mother, was the great upholder of the English 
interest ; James Beaton, Archbishop of St. Andrews and 
Chancellor, was the leader of the French party. Wolsey 
tried hard to get hold of Beaton on various pretexts, but 
Beaton was too cunning for him, and held himself apart in 
his own strong castle of St. Andrews, where he kept up 
dealings with France. But the English party were for a time 
the stronger, and, by the advice of Henry, James, who was 
now twelve years old, was set up to rule in his own name, 
and took his place at the head of the parliament, August 
1524. The only change made by this step, called the erec- 
tion, was that Albany's nominal government was done away 
with, and the French influence much weakened. Still Henry's 
interference was not liked, and the capture of Francis the 
First at Pavia turned the tide of popular feeling back to 



86 THE JAMESES. [chap. 

the old allies of France. Since the erection, Arran had 
been the nominal head of the government, but in 1526 the 
King, who was now fourteen, was considered old enough to 
choose his own guardians. He chose the Earls of Errol, 
Argyle, and Angus, and an agreement was made that each 
in succession was to have the care of the King for three 
months. Angus's turn came first, but at the end of it he 
refused to give up his charge, and for two years he tyran- 
nized over both the King and his subjects, and successfully 
resisted all attempts at a rescue. 

26. Fall of Angus. — James at last contrived to make his 
escape by riding in the night, disguised as a groom, from 
Falkland to Stirling Castle, 1528. Now that he was at last 
safely out of the hands of the Douglases, he set to work to 
crush them utterly. It was made treason for any who bore 
that name to come within six miles of the King, and an act 
of forfeiture was passed against them. Angus had many 
adherents ; but as all those nobles who hoped for a share 
of his lands took part with the King, they proved too strong 
for him, and he was at last obliged to give in, and to flee 
for refuge to England. Thus the overthrow of the Red 
Douglases was as thorough as had been that of the elder 
branch, on whose ruin they had risen. 

27. Internal Affairs. — James began his reign by executing 
summary justice on the lawless and turbulent part of his sub- 
jects. The Borderers were now nearly as troublesome as the 
Highlanders. They dwelt in the debateable ground between 
England and Scotland, and preyed on either country with the 
greatest impartiality. Certain families, as the Kerrs, Arm- 
strongs, and Scolts, had a sort of monopoly of this wholesale 
thieving ; and as they had taken to the clan system of the 
Celts, each robber chief in his peel tower could count, not 
only on the unquestioning service, but also on the personal 
devotion of every man in his following. John Armstrong 






v.] ENGLISH WAR. 87 

had made himself famous among them by his daring 
deeds. For this renown James made him pay dear ; for 
judging that he, the most notorious offender, would make 
the most telling example of the force of justice, he had 
him seized and hanged like a common thief. New means 
were tried for quieting the disturbances in the Western 
Highlands and Isles. Argyle was deprived of his lieu- 
tenancy, and the government was in future to deal directly 
with the chiefs for the collection of taxes and of the feudal 
dues. Three persons were put to death in this reign for 
conspiracy and treason, all of whom were more or less 
connected with the banished Angus. These were the Lady 
Glammis, his sister ; the Master of Forbes, his brother-in- 
law ; and James Hamilton, the illegitimate brother of Arran, 
who was accused of being in league with him. 

28. English War, — Though the need of a reform in the 
Church was felt and openly discussed in parliament, and the 
shortcomings of the clergy were unsparingly ridiculed by 
the popular poets, still neither the King nor the people were 
inclined to break off from Rome, as Henry the Eighth had 
done. But Henry was most anxious that his nephew should 
follow his example, and a meeting between them at York 
was agreed on. But James, doubtful of Henry's good faith, 
did not keep tryst. Henry was furious ; he brought up 
again the old claim of supremacy over Scotland, and to en- 
force the claim he sent an army to invade Scotland. James 
prepared to avenge this attack ; but when his army got as 
far as the Border, the nobles refused to go further, and a 
body of ten thousand men who had passed the Esk were 
surprised and scattered by Dacre, while they were contend- 
ing about the chief command. 

29. Death and Character of James.— The King mean- 
while was waiting in Caerlaverock Castle, At the same time 
that he heard of the shameful defeat of his army at Solway 



88 THE JAMESES. [chap. 

Most, the news was brought that a daughter was born to him. 
This child was heir to the throne, for his two sons had died in 
infancy. James thought that the birth of a girl at this time 
was an ill omen for Scotland. He murmured, " It came wi' 
a lass, and it'll gang wi' a lass." By this he meant that, as 
it was by Marjory Bruce that the crown had first passed into 
the Stewart family, so with this infant it would pass from 
it. Eight days later he died of grief and disappointment, 
December 14, 1542. James is the first King of Scots of 
whom we have a portrait. He was handsome, but had red 
hair, which won him the nickname of the " Red Tod," or red 
fox. He was not liked by the nobles, but the commons 
loved him well. His habit of going about in disguise fami- 
liarly among the people, endeared him to them, and led him 
into many amusing adventures. James was twice married, 
first to Magdalen, daughter of Francis the First, King oj 
France ; secondly, to Mary, daughter of the Duke of Guise, 
widow of the Duke of Longueville. In character and policy 
James was something like James the First. Like him, he 
strove to curb the power of the nobles, and to win for the 
Crown something more than mere nominal power, by making 
reforms which were much needed in the administration of 
justice. He worked out his ancestor's idea of a supreme 
court of justice by founding the Court of Session, or College 
of Justice. This court consisted first of thirteen, afterwards 
of fifteen, members, half of whom were clerks, and who 
acted both as judge and jury. As the members of this 
court were chosen from the parliament, it had the power of 
parliament, and was supreme in all civil cases, there being no 
appeal beyond it. James was not only a patron of letters, 
but himself a poet, one of the few royal poets whose writings 
will bear comparison with those of meaner birth. " Christ's 
Kirk on the Green," and the " Gaberlunzie Man/' are the 
titles of two poems that are ascribed to him, but on no 



v.] MARY. 89 

very certain proof. They are both descriptions of scenes 
from peasant life. If indeed they were written by him, the 
choice of the subjects and the way in which they are tie ted 
show how well he knew the condition of his people. They, 
in loving remembrance of the favour he had always shown 
them, gave him the title of " King of the Commons, and 
the People's Poet." 

30. Mary, 1542 - 1554. Arran's Regency — James 
Hamilton, Earl of Arran, next heir to the throne by his 
descent from James the Second, was chosen Regent, but, as 
it was the Scotch custom that the nearest of kin on the 
mother's side should have the care of the minor, the infant 
Queen was left in charge of her mother, Mary of Lorraine. 
The defeat at Solway Moss, and the death of the King, had 
left the people nearly as dispirited and defenceless as they 
had been after Flodden, and Henry the Eighth determined 
to get the kingdom into his power by marrying Mary to his 
son Edward, Prince of Wales. 

31. Treaties with England. — To carry out his plans the 
better, he sent Angus back to Scotland, and with him the 
Lords Cassilis and Glencairn, and several other nobles, all 
pledged to do their best to place the Queen and the strong- 
holds in the hands of Henry. These nobles were called by 
the English the Assured Scots, because Henry thought he 
could be sure of their help, but they were either unable or 
unwilling to give him the aid for which he had hoped It 
was not till July in the next year that two treaties were 
drawn up at London : the one for the English alliance ; 
the other agreeing to the English marriage of the Queen. 
But there was a strong national party, much set against 
any dealings with England ; and, though the treaties were 
approved at one meeting of the Estates, it was plain 
that they would be thrown out at the next. The Regent 
tried to break them off, and Henry, greatly enraged, made 



90 THE JAMESES. [chap. 

ready for war, and seized some Scotch ships which had 
been driven by stress of weather into English ports. This 
was reason enough for the rejection of the treaties by the 
Estates. Shortly after, the " Assured Scots " changed sides 
and made a bond with the Regent ; but Henry got a new 
supporter in Matthew Stewart, Earl of Lennox, who, as 
he wished to marry Margaret Douglas, daughter of Angus ; 
Henry's niece and ward, was eager to do anything to win 
Henry's favour. 

32. First English Invasion. — War was declared at Edin- 
burgh by an English herald, May 1, 1544, and an English 
army under Edward Seymour, Earl of Hertford, was sent by 
sea and landed at Granlon. He was bidden to destroy Edin- 
burgh and as many other towns and villages as he con- 
veniently could, and he carried out his orders to the letter. 
He sacked and burned Leith, a wealthy trading town, set fire 
to Edinburgh, though no resistance had been made to him 
there, robbed the burghs on the coast of Fife, and then 
marched south to the Border, burning, slaying, spoiling, and 
leaving a wasted land behind him. The only resistance he 
met with was near the Border, where a division of his army 
which had been sent to Melrose to break open the tombs of 
the ancestors of Angus was routed at Ancrum by Angus 
himself and some of the Border lords. At the news of this 
success six hundred Borderers from the Scottish side, who 
had been fighting in the service of the English Wardens, 
changed sides and attacked their former brothers in arms. 
The rest of the nation then took heart, and a large force was 
mustered and brought to the Border, but did nothing. 

33. Second English Invasion, — Before the traces of his 
former ravages had disappeared, just when the next harvest 
was ready for the sickle, Hertford appeared again at the head 
of a motley host, swelled by half-savage Irish and by foreign 
hirelings, and repeated the wild work of the year before. The 



v.] ENGLISH INVASIONS. 91 

invaders attacked and plundered the religious houses. The 
ruins of Kelso, Melrose, Dryburgh, Roxburgh, and Cold- 
ingham still bear witness to their zeal in carrying out the 
orders of their master. Towns, manors, churches, and 
between two and three hundred villages were left in ashes 
behind them. All this misery was wantonly inflicted without 
winning for Henry a foot of ground or a single new subject. 

34. Third English Invasion. Battle of Pinkie. — Two years 
passed, and again the sorely scourged country was visited 
by its old enemy. He7 r tfoi'd, now Duke of Somerset and 
Protector of England during the minority of Edward the 
Sixth, thought by one well-aimed blow to wrest from the 
people their proud boast, the national independence. Two 
armies, the one led by himself and the other sent by sea, 
met at Musselburgh and threatened the capital. The Regent 
had mustered a large force to resist them, and the two hosts 
faced each other on opposite banks of the Esk. But the 
Scots very foolishly left their strong position and forced 
the English to a battle, in which they were again defeated 
with great slaughter, at Pinkie, September 10, 1547. After 
the battle Somerset went back to England, and took the 
greater part of his army with him. As most of the strong- 
holds were now in the hands of the English, it was thought 
best to send the Queen to France that she might be out of 
harm's way. The French sent six thousand men to help in 
driving out the English, a work that was not ended till 1550, 
when a short peace followed the nine years of cruel war. If 
we consider the difference of the times and the advance of 
civilization, the fiercest raids of Malcolm and of Wallace 
may be favourably compared with the misery wrought by 
Hertford 'in these three savage and unprovoked attacks. 

35. Internal Affairs. — The overthrow of the monasteries, 
the seizure of their revenues, and the other changes in reli- 
gious matters carried out by Henry the Eighth in England, 



92 THE JAMESES. [chap. 

had been approved by a large party in Scotland. They 
were eager to begin the same work there, for the Church, 
by her abuse of power and by her persecution of all who 
differed from her, was fast losing her hold upon the people. 
The first outbreak of the popular feeling was the murder 
of Cardinal David Beaton, the Primate, the leader of the 
French party in the state and the chief mover of religious 
persecution. In revenge for the burning of George IVis/iart 
in 1545, for preaching what was called heresy, sixteen of 
Wishart's followers murdered Beaton in his own Castle of 
St. Andrews, which they had entered by a stratagem, and 
which they held for fourteen months, setting at defiance all 
the Regent's efforts to retake it. It was only with the help of 
the French that they were at last obliged to give in, and were 
sent to the French galleys. Among them was John Knox, 
who twelve years later became famous as the apostle of the 
Reformation among his countrymen. On the death of Beaton, 
Arran made his own ambitious brother John Archbishop of 
St. Andrews, in the room of the murdered Cardinal. The 
castle was destroyed. 

36. Regency of Mary of Lorraine. First Marriage of 
Mary Stewart. — In 1554, Arran, who had been created Duke 
oj 'Chatelheraultby the French king, went back to France, and 
Mary of 'Lorraine became Regent. The league with France 
was drawn still closer by the marriage of the Queen with 
Francis the Dauphin. Francis became King of France in 1 559. 
The crown-matrimonial of Scotland was then granted to him, 
so that the two countries were for a short time united under 
one crown. On the strength of this the French began to 
give themselves airs of superiority which the Scots could ill 
bear from strangers, and before long they became well-nigh 
as unpopular as the English had been. The Regent was 
unconsciously doing her best to foster this feeling of dislike 
by placing foreigners in offices of trust, above all by making 



v.] SOCIAL PROGRESS. 93 

Frenchmen keepers of the strongholds. But there was 
another influence now at work, the desire of religious reform, 
which wrought a change in the national life greater than any 
that had been felt since the time of the first Robert. 

37. Social Progress. — The intercourse with the French 
which arose from the close alliance of Scotland with France, 
influenced the social development of the nation throughout 
this period more strongly than during any other time either 
before or after it. The members of the National Council 
when they met in parliament were not, as in England, 
divided into lords and commons ; the representatives of the 
three Estates, the Barons, the Cle?gy, and the Commons, 
assembled in one chamber, as was the French custom. All 
the tenants holding direct from the Crown were required to 
present themselves at these assemblies ; but James the First 
released the lesser barons from this attendance, which they 
felt to be rather an irksome duty than a privilege, by allowing 
them to send commissaries in their stead. These commis- 
saries, with the deputies from the cities and burghs, formed 
the Third Estate. The supreme court of justice, the Court 
of Session, established by James the Fifth, was formed on 
the model of the Parliament of Paris. The Universities 
were founded in the fifteenth century, at St. Andrews, at 
Glasgow, and at Aberdeen. Of these, Aberdeen was an 
exact imitation of the University of Paris. The architecture 
of this period, both domestic and ecclesiastical, is in many 
respects like the French. Melrose Abbey, and the palaces 
of Falkland and of Stirling, which were very richly orna- 
mented, were built in the time of the Jameses. The houses 
of the nobles were also built in imitation of the French 
style. There are no remains of burgh domestic architecture 
older than the sixteenth century. Many French words also 
found their way into the Lowland Scotch, as the language of 
the Lothians came to" be called. By this time there was so 



94 THE JAMESES. [chap- 



much difference between this dialect and that spoken at the 
English court, that the people who spoke the one could 
scarcely understand the other. The foreign trade of Scotland 
was most prosperous during the reign of James the Fourth. 
Fish, wools, and hides were the principal exports. By this 
time coal, which is first mentioned towards the end of the 
thirteenth century, was in general use. There were also 
lead and iron mines ; and gold was found, though 'not in 
any large quantities. Of this native gold James the Fourth 
struck some beautiful coins, which were called bonnet pieces, 
because they bore the image of the King wearing a bonnet. 
The state of the people at this time was one of almost serf- 
like dependence on their lords. But great as the power of 
the nobles was, there were no forest or game laws in Scot- 
land, nor did they enjoy any privilege of peerage. An offender 
against the law, if he could be brought to justice, had "to 
" thole an assize," like any peasant, however high his rank 
might be. 

38. Education and Literature. — In early times all the edu- 
cation that was within the reach of the people had been 
offered to them by the Church. Schools were founded and 
maintained in several towns by the great monasteries, and 
there was provision made for the education of the choristers 
attached to the several cathedral churches. In later times 
there were Grammar Schools founded by the burgh corpora- 
tions. In 1496 an Act was passed requiring all " barons and 
freeholders" to keep their sons at these schools until they 
should be " competently founded," and have " perfect Latin," 
under pain of a fine of twenty pounds. A book, purporting 
to be the History of Scot/and, was written in Latin by 
Hector Boece, the first Principal of the University of Aber- 
deen. The greater part of this book is purely imaginary. 
The Latin " Scotichronicon" of Fordun, was continued by 
Walter Bower, Abbot of Inchcolm, down to the middle of 



v.] LITERATURE. 95 

the fifteenth century. Besides the two kings James the First 
and Fifth, there were other notable poets in Scotland in the 
middle of the fifteenth century. Blind Harry, the Minstrel, 
then did for Wallace what about a century before Barbour 
had done for Bruce, by putting together all the popular 
stories of his deeds in a spirit-stirring poem that bears his 
hero's name. William Dunbar, a friar of the order of St. 
Francis, wrote a poem called The Thistle and the Rose, 
to celebrate the marriage of James the Fourth with Mar- 
garet Tudor. This, and the Golden Terge, and the Dance of 
the Seven Deadly Sins, are the best among his writings. 
Gawin Douglas, afterwards Bishop of Dunkeld, the son of 
that Earl of Angus who was nicknamed Bell-the-Cat, also 
wrote several poems in the beginning of the sixteenth cen- 
tury. Those best known are King Hart, the Palace oj 
Honour, and a translation of Virgil's JEneid. Some years 
after Douglas wrote, Sir David Lyndesay, the companion of 
James the Fifth's childhood, and the mourner of his untimely 
death, directed many clever satires against the abuses in 
the Church, the vices of the clergy, and the follies of the 
court. The Dreme, the Satire of the Three Estates, and the 
Monarchy, are his best poems. 

39. Summary. — During this period, which extends over 
more than a century, the country made little progress either 
socially or politically. Of the five kings, all bearing the 
same name, who in turn wore the crown, four died violent 
deaths ; and of these four, two were treacherously murdered 
by their own subjects. Most of them came to the throne in 
childhood ; not one attained old age. Their reigns were 
chiefly passed in struggles to put down their lawless and 
turbulent nobles, who in each succeeding minority waxed 
more powerful and more independent. In the reigns of 
James the Second and of James the Fifth, this contest 
between the Crown and the Baronage took the form of a 



96 THE REFORMATION. [chap. 

struggle between the House of Stewart and the House of 
Douglas. In both cases the King compassed the fall of his 
rival only by placing a dangerous amount of power in the 
hands of the other nobles. The foreign policy of Scotland 
under the Jameses was very simple. It consisted in main^ 
taining a close alliance with France and a constant quarrel 
with England. But the French never gave the Scots any 
real help, and the English were so much taken up at home 
with the Civil Wars of the Roses that they made no serious 
attacks on the independence of Scotland. Though during 
this period there were four long minorities, there was no 
attempt made to break the regular line of succession. This 
was due partly to the attachment of the people to the royal 
line, and partly to the weakness of the royal authority, for 
the King had so little real power that the great nobles did 
not think the crown worth taking. The reign of James the 
Fourth was the most peaceful and prosperous, but James the 
First did the most for the welfare of the people. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE REFORMATION. 

The Reformation (i) — state of the Church (2) — the first Covenant 
(3) — religious riots (4) — treaties with England (5) — Reformation 
statutes (6)— return of the Queen (7) — division of the Church 
lauds (8)— fall of Hunlly (9) — second marriage of the Queen (10) 
— murder of Rizzio (11)— flight to Dunbar (12) — murder of 
Darnley (13) — third marriage of the Queen (14) — surrender at 
Car berry (15) — captivity of the Queen (16) — James VI. ; Regency 
of Murray (17)— escape of Mary (18)— Battle of langside ; flight 
of Mary (19) — the Conference (20) — state of parties (21) — murder 
of the Regent (22) — Regency of lennox (23) — taking cf Dunbarton 



VI.] THE REFORMATION. 97 

(24) — Parliament at Stirling (25) — Regency of Mar (26) — Tulchan 
bishops (27) — death of Knox (28) — taking of Edinburgh (29) 
— Regency of Morton (30) — fall of Morton (31) — raid of Ruthvcn 
(3 2 )—f a H °f Gowrie (33)— fall of Arran (34) — death of Mary 
— (35) marriage of the King (36) — abolition of episcopacy (37) — 
the Spanish blanks (38) — religious tumults (39) — the Cowrie Plot 
(40) — union of the Crowns (41) — state of the nation (42) — 
summary (43). 

I. The Reformation. — Five hundred years had gone by- 
sin ce the English, who fled from the Norman Conqueror, 
had brought about a great social revolution in the Celtic 
kingdom, where they found a refuge. We now find another 
revolution arising from a very similar cause. But there was 
a difference in the way in which these great changes were 
wrought out characteristic of the two centuries in which they 
took place. In the eleventh century it was the influence of 
the Court which little by little changed the people ; in the 
sixteenth century, the people struggled against, and in the 
end overcame, the opposition of the Court. When Mary 
Tudor became Queen of England, she wished to place the 
English Church under the authority of the Pope, even more 
than it had been before the changes of her father Henry. 
All who held the Reformed doctrines were persecuted as 
heretics. Many of these so-called heretics sought safety 
across the Border, in Scotland, and were welcomed there 
with a kindness that would have seemed impossible but 
a few years before, when the deadly war was waging. But 
religious sympathy got the better of national hate, and thus 
the religious zeal of Mary Tudor may be said to have 
hastened the Reformation in Scotland, which the cruelties 
of Henry and of Somerset had for a while delayed. Still 
the traditional bent of the national feeling influenced the 
character of the new movement, and led the Scottish Re- 
formers to mould anew the polity and form of worship of 

M H 



98 THE REFORMATION. [chap. 

their Church after the model of the French Calvijiists, rather 
than to follow the example of the Church of Englafid in her 
merely doctrinal reform. 

2. State of the Church. — In Scotland, as in the other lands 
of Western Christendom, the clergy had lost their hold on 
the commons by their immorality and irreligion ; their greed 
of money, and their abuse of their spiritual powers ; while 
they had roused the jealousy of the nobles by their wealth, 
and by the influence won by their learning, which, though it 
was often but little, secured to them the offices of state. 
The hope of getting hold of some of the well-cultivated 
Church lands, led many lairds, as landholders are called in 
Scotland, to join the popular movement of Reform. 

3. The First Covenant. — The friends of Reform were thus 
silently becoming a power in the state, and, as had been the 
Scottish custom for centuries, they joined themselves to- 
gether by a bond, 1557. In this bond they pledged them- 
selves to support one another, and to do their utmost for the 
spread of the new doctrines. This bond is called the First 
Covenant. By it the authority of the Pope was renounced, 
and the use of the English Bible and of the Prayer Book of 
Edward VI. was enjoined. Thenceforth the barons who had 
signed it, called themselves the Lords of the Congregation. 
The burning of Walter Mill, an aged priest of blameless life, 
who suffered for heresy at St. Andrews in 1558, roused them 
to action. They demanded of the Regent a reformation 
of religion after the principles of their bond. Though at 
first she seemed inclined to grant what they asked, she 
afterwards set her face against them, and cited some of the 
preachers of the new doctrines before the Privy Council. A 
great body of their followers gathered at Perth to come with 
them ; the Regent, in alarm, begged them to disperse and 
promised to withdraw the citation. Instead of doing this, 
she outlawed the preachers for not coming. 






VI.} RELIGIOUS TUMULTS. 99 

4- Religious Riots.— This breach of promise on the 
Regent's part provoked their followers to a breach of the 
peace. The mob attacked, and tried to pull down, the churches 
and the religious houses at Perth, May ir, 1559, and this 
tumult was followed by riots of the same kind in other towns. 
John Knox was the spiritual leader of the movement. But 
he only wished to destroy the images and ornaments in the 
churches, which he looked on as idolatrous, not the churches 
themselves. Nor is it to be laid to the charge of the Re- 
formers that there is but one cathedral church left entire 
in Scotland ; the ruin of far the greater number of the 
churches and religious houses is due to the English inva- 
sions, or to the neglect of later times. After this outbreak 
the Congregation strengthened themselves in Perth, but 
many of the Lords, among others the Lord James Stewart, 
illegitimate son of James the Fifth, joined the Regent, and, 
had she been true to her promises, the strife which now 
broke out between the two parties might have been pre- 
vented. But she led a French force against the Con- 
gregation, who were now in open rebellion. An agree- 
ment was made that the questions at issue between them 
should be left to be settled by the Estates, while both 
armies laid down their arms, and the French garrison 
was turned out of Perth. But the Regent did not keep 
to the spirit of this treaty, though she avoided breaking 
the letter of it by garrisoning Perth with native troops 
hired with French money. On this the Congregation flew 
to arms, seized St. Andrews, and occupied Edinburgh. 
There, in a meeting which they called a Parliament, they 
deposed the Regent, though they still professed loyalty 
to the King and Queen. But they were too weak to 
hold the advantage they had won, and as Elizabeth had 
now succeeded Mary in England, they looked to her for 
support. 

H 2 



loo THE REFORM A TION. [chap. 

5. Treaties with England. — Elizabeth would not treat with 
subjects in open rebellion against their Sovereign, though 
Mary had given her good reason for offence, by quartering 
the arms of England on her shield, as though she were 
lawful Queen and Elizabeth only a usurper. At last a treaty 
was arranged at Berwick in 1560, between Elizabeth and the 
rebels. Chatelherault, the next heir to the Scottish crown, 
acted for the Congregation, and by this treaty Elizabeth 
promised to send troops to prevent the French conquering 
Scotland. The war that now followed presented the un- 
wonted sight of the Scots on Scottish ground fighting side 
by side with the English against their old allies of France. 
But, before the year was out, the French were called away by 
troubles at home, and by the treaty of Edinburgh it was 
agreed that no foreigners should in future be employed in 
the country without the consent of the Estates. The Estates 
promised in the name of the King and Queen that they 
should acknowledge Elizabeth as lawful Queen of England, 
and thenceforth make no pretension to her kingdom. 

6. Reformation Statutes. — Soon after the conclusion of 
this treaty, the Regent died. The Estates then approved the 
Geneva Confession of Faith, abjured the authority of the 
Pope, and forbade the saying of the mass, or even assist- 
ing at the mass, on pain of forfeiture for the first offence, 
banishment for the second, death for the third ; 25th August, 
1 560. Thus the old ecclesiastical system, with all its rites 
and ceremonies, was suddenly overthrown. But this was 
only in name ; in reality it only died out bit by bit. 

7. Return of the Queen. — Just a year after this, the Queen 
came home, August 1561. She was now a widow, so the 
Scots were freed from the fear they had felt of seeing their 
country sink into a province of France. The people, who 
had an almost superstitious reverence for kingship, which 
was very inconsistent with their contempt for kingly authority, 



vi.] 



BOOK OF DISCIPLINE. 101 



welcomed her with open arms, and showed their good will by 
a greater display of discordant and grotesque rejoicing than 
the austere teachers of the new doctrines could approve. As 
yet they only saw in her the representative of that long line 
of Celtic kings whom they chose to look on as their own. 
She was the " child," for whom they had struggled so long, 
and had suffered so much from the English. They had yet 
to find out that she had come back to them French in all 
but birth, gifted with wit, intellect, and beauty, but subtle 
beyond their power of searching, and quite as zealous for 
the old form of religion as they were for the new one. The 
Queen, too, who came thus as a stranger among her own 
people, had to deal with a state of things unknown in former 
reicms. Hitherto the Church had taken the side of the 
Crown against the nobles ; now both were united against 
the Crown, whose only hope lay in the quarrels between 
these ill-matched allies. 

8. Division of the Church Lands.-The chief cause of 
discord between them was the property of the Church. The 
Reformed ministers fancied that they had succeeded, not only 
to the Pope's right of dictation in all matters, public and 
private, but to th § e lands of the Church as well. To neither 
of these claims would the Lords agree. They were as little 
inclined to submit to the tyranny of presbyters as to the 
tyranny of the Pope. They withstood the ministers who 
wished to forbid the Queenand her attendants hearing mass 
in her private chapel, and they refused to accept as law the 
First look of Discipline, a code of rules drawn up by the 
ministers for the guidance of the new Church. As to the 
land, much of it had already passed into the : hands of 
aymen, who, with the lands, generally bore the title of the 
CWh dignitary who had formerly held them. The Privy 
Council took one-third of what remained to pay the stipends 
of the ministers, while the rest was supposed to remain in 



102 THE REFORMATION. [chap. 

the hands of the Churchmen in possession, and, as they died 
out, it was to fall in to the Crown. 

Fall of Huntly. — Lo?'d James Stewart, Prior of St. 
Andrews, whom the Queen created Earl of Murray, was the 
hope of the Protestants, but in the north the Romanists were 
still numerous and strong. Their head was the Earl of 
Huntly, chief of the Gordons, who reigned supreme over most 
of the north, and whose word was law where decrees of par- 
liament would have been set at nought. As his great power 
was looked on as dangerous to the state, his downfall was 
resolved on. Murray and the Queen set out for the north 
to visit him, as was said, but with so large a force that he 
thought it expedient to keep out of their way. His Castle of 
Inverness was besieged and taken and the governor hanged, 
and his followers were defeated and he himself slain at Cor- 
richie, near Aberdeen, in 1562. His body was brought to 
Edinburgh, as was the custom in cases of treason, that the 
sentence of forfeiture might be passed on it. His son was 
beheaded at Aberdeen ; and thus the power of the Gordons 
was broken. Thus Mary during the first part of her reign 
showed no favour to the Romanists, but still she did not 
confirm the Reformation Statutes. 

10. Second Marriage of the Queen. — The most interest- 
ing question now for all parties was, whom the Queen would 
marry. Many foreign princes were talked of, and Elizabeth 
suggested her own favourite, the Earl of Leicester, but Mary 
settled the matter herself by falling in love with her own 
cousin, Henry Stewart, Lord Darnley. He was son of 
Lennox and Margaret Douglas, and was therefore the grand- 
son of Margaret Tudor, and was received as first prince of 
the blood at the English court. Mary called a special 
council and announced to them her intended marriage. 
She then raised Darnley to the Earldom of Ross, and after- 
wards created him Duke of Albany They were married 



VI.] 



MURDER OF RIZZIO. i°3 



with the rites of the Romish Church, July 29, i5°5. Murray 
had refused his consent to the marriage. He and some 
others of the lay Lords now took up arms. They go. into 
the town of Edinburgh, but were fired at from the Cas le, 
and, as they were disappointed in their hopes of ts 

the; retreated to Dumfries. There they issued a declaration 
that their religion was in danger, and that the Queen had 
acted unconstitutionally in proclaiming Darnley King of 
Scots without the consent of the Estates. The feudal force 
was summoned, and the King and Queen led it against _them 
On this the Lords retreated into England and disarmed their 

followers. . c , 

„. Murder of Rkzio.-Mary soon began to tire of her 
worthless husband. She had all the weakness of her family 
for making favourites, and no wisdom in the choice of them. 
At this time she had taken a fancy to an Italian, Dav^dh'Z- 
*io, who acted as her secretary, and who had great sk.U m 
music to recommend him. The nobles grew jealous of this 
foreigner and determined to get rid of him; but, to save them- 
selves from any ill-consequences of the murder which they had 
planned, they persuaded Darnley to sign a bond promising 
Z stand by them in anything they might do. At the same 
time he signed another bond for the recall of Murray and the 
other banished lords. The Queen summoned a parliament, 
which she expected would pronounce sentence of forfeiture 
on those banished lords. In order to secure compliance 
with her wishes, she interfered with the choosing of the 
Lords of the Articles, into whose hands all the real business 
of the parliament was thrown. One evening, as she was 
sitting at supper in the palace at Holyrood, the conspirators 
had seaired the gates, burst into the room, headed 
by the Lord Ruthven. They seized on R.zz.o, who clutched 
a the Queen for help ; they dragged him into the outer room ; 
killed him, and then threw the body downstairs, March 9, 



104 THE REFORMA TION. [chap. 

1566. His fate was not made known to the Queen till next 
day. James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, who already stood 
high in the Queen's favour, and the Earl of Huntly, who 
had been restored to the titles and estates which his father 
had forfeited, were in the palace when it was thus taken 
possession of, but they contrived to escape. 

12. Flight to Dunbar. — The Queen showed no signs of 
anger at first. She pretended to be reconciled to Darnley, 
and promised pardon to the banished lords. When they 
appeared before her the next day, she received Murray affec- 
tionately. But the confederates soon found that they had 
been mistaken in their hopes of Darnley, for in the night 
following he fled with the Queen to Dunbar. Bothwell 
brought up a force for her protection, and before the end of 
the' month she re-entered Edinburgh. Rizzio's body was 
taken up and buried among the kings in the palace chapel, 
and James Douglas, Earl of Morton, Ruthven, and others 
were cited to answer for the murder of Rizzio, and, as they 
did not appear, they were outlawed. 

13. Murder of Darnley. — A new favourite soon took the 
place of Rizzio in the Queen's favour. This was Bothwell, 
who had lately done such good service in coming to her 
aid at Dunbar. The abbey-lands of Melrose and Had- 
dington were given to him. He was made Lord High 
Admiral, and Warden of the Borders, and it was noticed 
that it was he and not Darnley who played the principal 
part at the baptism of her son, the Bri?ice of Scotland. 
Darnley was hated by everyone ; by his wife, because he 
had connived at the murder of her favourite, and by his 
accomplices for his treachery in deserting them. Shortly 
after this he fell ill of the small-pox, and was taken to 
Glasgow, to be tended by his father, Lennox. There, when 
he was getting better, the Queen paid him a visit, and 
proposed that he should be taken to Craigmillar Castle, in 



VI.] MURDER OF DARNLEY. 105 

order to hasten his recovery ; but this plan was afterwards 
changed, and he went instead to a house called the Kirk- 
o'-Field, close to Edinbn? gh. This house was blown up on 
the night of February 9, 1567, while the Queen was present 
at a ball at Holyrood, and the bodies of Darnley and of his 
page were found in a field hard by, as though they had been 
killed while trying to make their escape. It was commonly 
believed that Bothwell was guilty of the murder, and it was 
suspected that he had done it to please the Queen and 
with her consent. This suspicion was strengthened by her 
conduct. She made no effort to find out the murderer and 
to bring him to punishment, and on the day of the funeral 
she gave Bothwell the feudal superiority over the town of 
Leith. Lennox now came forward and demanded that 
Bothwell and the other persons suspected of the murder 
should be tried by the Estates. This was granted, and a 
day was fixed for the trial. But as Lennox was forbidden 
to bring any but his own household when he appeared as 
the accuser of the murderer, while Bothwell had a great 
following, he thought it more prudent not to appear. As 
no one came forward to bring evidence against Bothwell, 
he was acquitted, and he offered to give wager of battle to 
anyone who should still accuse him. 

14. Third Marriage of the Queen. — Bothwell was now 
determined on marrying the Queen, and, after the parliament 
rose, he got many of the nobles to sign a bond agreeing to 
help him to do so. As he was already married to Huntly's 
sister, his wife had to be got rid of first. This was 
not now such an easy matter as it had been in former times. 
The canon law had been done away with along with the old 
Church ; the Reformers had set up a court of their own to try 
such cases, while the Queen had lately restored the old one. 
To make the matter sure BothwelPs marriage was dissolved 
in both these courts. As the Queen was coming back fiom 



106 THE REFORMATION. [chap. 

Stirling, where she had been to visit her child, Bothwell met 
her and carried her off to Dunbar, and on the day the 
divorce was sent they came back to Edinburgh together. He 
was created Duke of Orkney and Shetland, and they were 
married by Adam Bothwell, who had been Bishop of Orkney, 
but was now one of the ministers of the new Church, May 
15, 1567. 

15. Surrender at Carberry. — A fortnight later Mary called 
out the feudal force for an attack on the Borderers, but the 
barons did not answer to her summons. On this the Queen 
and Bothwell, alarmed at the increasing signs of discontent, 
shut themselves up in his strong castle of Borthwick, but 
they were scarcely there before an army with the Lords 
Morton and Home at its head appeared at its gates, and 
they fled to Dunbar. The barons then entered Edinburgh ; 
the governor of the Castle gave it up to them. They had 
the Prince in their hands, and they took measures for carry- 
ing on the government, though they still professed to act in 
the Queen's name, and to be only striving to free her from 
Bothwell. He meanwhile had mustered his followers, who, 
though nearly equal in numbers, were in discipline far 
inferior to their opponents. The two armies came in sight 
near Musselburgh, but there was no battle, for the Queen 
surrendered to William Kirkcaldy of Grange, who had 
been sent out with a body of horse to cut off her retreat 
to Dunbar, at Carberry, June 15, 1567, on condition that 
Bothwell should be allowed to return to Dunbar unhurt. 
Bothwell escaped first to his own dukedom of Orkney, 
and afterwards to Denmark, where he died about ten years 
later. 

16. Captivity of the Queen. — Just a month after her third 
marriage the Queen was brought back to Edinburgh, to be 
greeted by the railings of the mob, who now openly accused 
her as a murderess, and paraded before her eyes a banner, 






vi.] JAMES THE SIXTH. 107 

showing the dead body of her husband; her infant son on his 
knees, as though praying for justice against the murderers 
of his father, and the words, " Judge and avenge my cause, 
O Lord," embroidered upon it. From Edinburgh she was 
taken to a lonely castle built on a small island in the centre 
of Loch Leven. A few days later a casket containing eight 
letters was produced. These letters, it was said, Bothwell 
had left behind him in his flight, and they seemed to have 
been written by Mary to him while Darnley was ill in 
Glasgow. If she really wrote them, they proved very plainly 
that she had planned the murder with Bothwell. They are 
called the " casket letters," from the box or casket in which 
they were found. The confederate barons acted as if they 
were really hers. The Lord Lindsay and Robert Melville 
were sent to her at Loch Leveii, and she there signed the 
demission of the government to her son, and desired that 
Murray should be the first Regent. From that time Mary 
ceased to be Queen of Scots. Her beauty, talents, and 
misfortunes have won her much pity and many champions, 
but it was her own folly and sin that changed the love of 
her people into hate, and their rejection of her stands out 
as one of the facts in their history that does most honour 
to the nation. 

17. James VI., 1567-1625. Regency of Murray. — The 
infant King who was now to be set up in the room of his 
mother was crowned and anointed at Stirling. By his 
sponsor Moi'ton he took an oath to uphold the Reformed, 
or as its supporters called it, the true Church, and to root 
out all heretics and enemies of the same. Murray was 
recalled from France, whither he had gone soon after the 
murder of the King. He made some objection to accepting 
the regency, and would not do so till he had had an interview 
with his sister, At last he agreed to take it, to comply with 
her wishes, as he said. As the country was crying out for 



108 THE REFORMATION. [chap. 

vengeance on the murderers of the King, four of Both well's 
creatures who had aided in his crime were hanged at Edin- 
burgh, but no steps were taken to punish the lords who 
had joined themselves by a bond with Bothwell. 

1 8. Escape of Mary. — But there was a large party of the 
nobles, with the Hamiltons at their head, who were opposed 
to the new government and kept themselves apart at Hamil- 
ton. Before a year of her captivity had passed, Mary escaped 
and joined them there, and again took up the sceptre which 
she had so lately laid down. Eighteen lords of parliament and 
many lesser barons signed a bond to uphold their Queen, and 
she sent a message from her court at Hamilton to Murray, 
who was at Glasgow almost unguarded, commanding him to 
resign the regency. Instead of obeying, Murray seized the 
herald who had come to proclaim the Queen ; sent to Stir- 
Wig for cannon, and called out the feudal force in the name 
of King James. 

19. Battle of Langside. — The Castle of Danbarton Rock^ 
the strongest fortress in the kingdom, was held for the Queem 
and to it she determined to go for greater safety. To get 
there she had to pass close by Glasgow, where Murray was. 
At Langside, on the southern shore of the Clyde, her way was 
barred by the King's army, which, though not so large as 
her own, had much better leaders. The fight that followed 
settled the fate of Scotland, May 13, 1568. Few lives were 
lost, for at the first charge the spears of the front rank got 
locked in the jacks of their opponents. They could thus 
neither go backward nor forward, and kept those behind 
from coming within arm's length of one another. Grange 
turned the day by charging the Queen's force with his cavalry. 
They fled in confusion, and Mary rode with all speed to the 
Border ; crossed the Solway, and going straight to Carlisle, 
threw herself on the protection of Elizabeth. But Elizabeth 
had not forgotten how Mary had assumed her arms and had 



vi.] THE CASKET LETTERS. 109 

given herself out as the real Queen of England ; and as she 
knew that Mary, if left at liberty, would plot with the English 
Roman Catholics, she put her in ward in Bolton Castle, and 
refused to see her till she cleared herself of the suspicion 
under which she lay of having been concerned in her hus- 
band's death. But at the same time Elizabeth would not 
acknowledge the government of Scotland, nor approve the 
conduct of the lords who had set up King James, for she did 
not like the doctrine that princes, however badly they had 
acted, might be judged and punished by their subjects. 

20. The Conference. — To give both parties a chance of 
saying what they could for themselves, it was agreed to hold 
a conference, to which Murray came in person, and Mary 
and Elizabeth each sent commissioners. The conference 
met at York in October. On opening it the Duke of Norfolk 
required that Murray should do homage in the name of his 
King to the Queen of England. On this, William Maitland 
of Lethington, the Scottish Secretary of State, a very subtle 
man, said that if England liked to give up again the northern 
counties, once held by Scotland, their King would gladly do 
homage for them ; but as for the kingdom it was as free, or 
more so, than England itself. This he said to show that 
they did not ask Elizabeth to judge between them because 
she had any right to interfere, but only because she was 
their nearest neighbour. Before the end of the month the 
conference was removed to Hampton Court, and held before 
the Queen in Council. The lords brought forward the 
" casket letters," as a proof against Mary, and she refused 
to vindicate herself, but ordered her commissioners to with- 
draw. Thus the conference ended, leaving matters much as 
they were before, for Elizabeth decided that nothing had 
been brought forward to the dishonour of Murray, nor any- 
thing proved against Mary. At the same time she lent 
Murray five thousand pounds for the maintenance of peace 



no THE REFORMATION. [chap. 



and order between the two countries, which was an indirect 
acknowledgment of his government. 

21. State of Parties. — The Hamiltons and Huntly were 
the chief upholders of Mary's interest. The Hamiltons wished 
to keep Mary on the throne, because they were the next 
heirs to Mary, and in the event of her son dying before her, 
Chatelherault could claim the crown But as they were not 
the next heirs to James, they Avere naturally opposed to the 
revolution which had placed him on the throne, for they 
feared that if he died when actually reigning, the crown 
would pass to his heir, Charles Stewart, his father's brother. 
Huntly held out, from hatred of Murray and love of the old 
Church, which was still strong in his county. A compromise 
was at last made between the two parties. Murray promised 
a pardon for all past otfences and a reversal of forfeitures 
if the other party would promise to obey King James. To 
make matters more sure, when the Duke of Chatelherault 
went up to Edinburgh, Murray put him in ward in the 
Castle. Just at this time there was a great rising of the 
Roman Catholics in the north of England. Murray marched 
southward, in order to be ready to put down any disturbance 
on the Border. There he seized as his prisoner the Earl of 
Northumberland, the head of the Romanists in England, 
who had come to seek a refuge on the Scottish side among 
the Borderers, many of whom still clung to the old Church. 

22. Murder of the Regent. — The Hamiltons had deter- 
mined on Murray's death. Though the Duke was in prison, 
John, the archbishop, the constant stirrer up of strife, was at 
liberty, and he was popularly supposed to be the contriver of 
a plot against the life of the Regent. Murray was murdered 
by James Hamilton of Bothwellhaugh, who shot at him as 
he was riding in state through that town on his way from 
Stirling to Edinburgh, February 23, 1570. This foul murder, 
the third which had disgraced Scotland within the last 



vi.] MURDER OF MURRAY. in 

quarter of a century, was a great misfortune for the country, 
for Murray had ruled well and wisely, he had put down the 
Highlanders and the Borderers, and had enforced justice 
and order with a strong hand. In his time the land was 
visited by a famine and a plague, evils for which the people 
are ever apt to blame their rulers, but, in spite of these 
calamities, he was popular during his life, and was remem- 
bered after his death as the Good Regent. 

23. Regency of Lennox. — While the government was thus 
without a head, and the country was in confusion, two 
English armies invaded Scotland to punish the Borderers 
for the shelter which they had given to the leaders of the 
late rising in England. One of these armies came north as 
far as the Clyde and wasted the Hamilton country. Hitherto 
the Queen's party had been chiefly made up of nobles with 
but a small following, but this attack on the part of the 
English aroused the old hatred of England and drove a 
large mass of the people to join them. The choice of 
Lennox, the King's grandfather, as the new Regent, did still 
more to divide the nation, for not only was he the subject of 
Elizabeth and recommended by her, but also, when he came 
to Scotland, it was as joint leader of one of these invading 
armies. Now, for the first time, the nation was truly divided 
against itself. The war which followed was the first real 
civil war in the annals of Scotland. It was no strife of 
class against class, or of one chief against another, but a 
war in which the commons were severed into two parties by 
the great questions of loyalty, national honour, and religion. 
Grange, whom Murray had made governor of Edinbiu gh 
Castle, declared for the Queen, and Lethington, who was 
there in ward on a charge of having had some part in the 
King's murder, followed his example. 

24. Taking of Dunbarton. — This castle, the strongest in 
the kingdom, was the chief strength of the Queen's party, and 



112 THE REFORMATION. [chap. 

in it was the moving spirit of the Hamiltons, John, the much 
hated and feared archbishop. Both fell during this regency. 
Crawford of Jordan/till, a retainer of Lennox, took the 
castle by subtlety with but a handful of men. He scaled 
the steep rock on which the castle is built under cover of 
the night, and when he had gained the highest point he 
turned the guns on the garrison below, who had no choice 
left but to give in, April 2, 1571. Five days later, the arch- 
bishop was hanged at Stirling, after the form of a trial had 
been hurried through, on a charge of having planned the 
murder of the King and of the Regent. 

25. Parliament at Stirling. — The other noteworthy event 
during the regency of Lennox was the holding of a parlia- 
ment, for the first time since 1 567. It met at Stirling, and the 
young King, who lived in the castle under the care of the 
Earl of Mar, was himself present. While the Regent and 
all the leaders of his party were thus gathered in the town, 
a body of four hundred men, sent out by the Queen's party 
in Edinburgh Castle, came down upon them suddenly, swept 
the streets, and captured Morton and the Regent ; and 
though the latter was afterwards rescued, he had been 
mortally wounded in the scuffle, and died after lingering a 
few hours, September 4, 1 57 1. It was then remembered 
how the little King had spied a hole in the cloth with which 
the board whereon he sat was covered, and, trying to poke 
his finger into it, had said, " There is a hole in this parlia- 
ment." This was looked on as a prophecy of the violent 
death of the Regent, and laid the foundation of that repu- 
tation for wisdom and acuteness which clung to James all 
his life. 

26. Mar's Regency. — John Erskine, Earl of Mar, governor 
of Stirling, was chosen Regent the very next day. As the 
Queen's party, who held Edinburgh, had held a rival par- 
liament in her name in the Parliament House, it was clear 



vi.] DEA TH OF KNOX. 



"3 



that all efforts must be made to get the castle out of their 
hands. Mar therefore began the siege, and open war broke 
out. The West, the North, and the Border were for the 
Queen, the eastern Lowlands for the King ; the latter looked 
to England for help, but got none ; the former appealed to 
France with not much better success. After much useless 
bloodshed, a truce of two months was agreed on, August 
1, 1572. 

27. Tulchan Bishops.— Under Mar episcopacy was set up 
again. At least it was settled that the titles and dignities of 
bishops and archbishops were to stay as they were before 
the Reformation till the King's majority, but they were shorn 
of their old authority, and were to be subject to the General 
Assembly, which now managed all church matters. The people 
thought so little of them that they called them in mockery 
" Tulchan " bishops : the word " Tulchan " meaning a sham 
calf which it was the custom to place before a cow to make 
her give milk when the real calf had been taken from 
her. About this time there came the news of the massacre 
of all the Protestants in Paris, on St. Bartholomew's Day. 
This roused a general horror of Romanists and created a 
reaction in favour of Presbytery, for the Scots wished to 
be more like the French Protestants, who had no bishops. 
It also made many of the Queen's party go over to the 
other side. 

Mar died after being little more than a year in office, and 
Morton, who had latterly directed everything, was chosen 
Regent in his place, November 24, 1572. 

28. Death of Knox. — On the same day died John Knox, 
who for thirteen years had been the leader of religious re- 
form in Scotland. He spent his life and his wonderful 
talents in striving for what he believed to be truth and sound 
doctrine. One of the finest traits in his character was his 
moral courage, which enabled him to speak the truth boldly 



114 THE REFORMATION. [chap. 

to those who stood highest in rank or power. To this Mor- 
ton himself bore witness, saying, as he looked on the dead 
body of Knox, "There lies he who never feared the face 
of man." His zeal sometimes led him to turn against the 
Romanists their own weapons of intolerance and persecution, 
but he lived in times when men had not yet found out that 
it was best to let one another alone in the matter of religion. 
In those days any one who had shown himself tolerant of 
the errors of others would have been looked on either as a 
hypocrite or as an unbeliever. But Knox was not so much 
opposed to bishops and to a set form of prayer as his followers 
afterwards became. He drew up a prayer-book for daily use 
called the Book of Common Order, which was pretty nearly 
a translation of the book of the church at Geneva, and was 
what he had himself used when ministering to the English 
Protestants who in the reign of Mary Tudor had taken refuge 
at Frankfort. 

29. Taking of Edinburgh. — With the new year the war 
began again. Morton was now in possession of the town 
of Edinburgh, and he held a meeting of the Estates there. 
But the castle still held out, and it was only by bringing 
against it an English force of fifteen hundred men that 
Elizabeth had at last sent, that its defenders were reduced to 
such straits that they were compelled to surrender. Grange 
gave himself up to the English general and appealed to the 
English Queen. But she either could not or would not pro- 
tect him. His gallant defence of the castle for Mary was 
looked on as treason against the government of James, which 
Elizabeth had in a manner acknowledged. He was given 
up into the hands of Morton, his bitter enemy, and hanged 
at Edinburgh, August 3, 1573, in spite of all the efforts of 
his many friends to save him. Brave, gallant, and unselfish, 
he was distinguished among a greedy generation by his con- 
tempt alike of money and of p.ace. In Lliis lie was a great 



VI. ] MOR TON'S RE GEJVC Y AND FALL. 1 1 5 

contrast to his companion, the clever, unprincipled, selfish 
Lethington, who died by his own hand. 

30. Morton's Regency. — Morton had now got all his old 
enemies out of the way, but he soon made more ; partly by 
his avarice, partly by the firmness with which he insisted that 
the crown property should be restored. He offended A r gyle 
by making him give back some crown jewels that had come 
into his possession by his marriage with Murray's widow ; 
and, by trying to stop a feud between him and A thole, he 
made enemies of them both. To make his power complete, 
Morton longed to get the King into his own hands, but he 
was kept apart in Stirling, under the care of Er^kine the 
Governor, and while there Morton had no more power over 
him than any of the other nobles. He tried to persuade 
James, who was now twelve years old, that he was old enough 
to rule alone, but Argyle and Athole, who were both in the 
castle at the time, found out his plan and outwitted him. A 
proclamation was suddenly issued by them, setting forth that 
the king would now take the government into his own hands, 
and would act by the advice of a council, March 4, 1578. 
A time of great confusion followed. Morton, who at first 
had seemed to lay down his power with a good grace, 
before long was up in arms, got into Stirling Castle, dis- 
persed the new council, and again directed everything just 
as he pleased. 

31. Fall of Morton. — About this time Es7nS Stewart, Lord 
of Aubigny, and nephew of the late Earl of Lennox, came 
from France and became a great favourite with his cousin 
the king. Aubigny was stirred up by James Stewart of 
Ochiltree, another favourite, to do his utmost to turn the king 
against Morton, whom he already disliked. At length Ochil- 
tree accused Morton before the Council of having been a 
party in the king's murder, and on this charge he was con- 
demned and beheaded at Edinburgh. After his death the two 

I 2 



u6 THE REFORMATION. [chap. 

favourites rose still higher. Aubigny was made Duke of 
Lennox, and Keeper of Dunbarton Castle ; and a royal 
bodyguard was set up in order to give him the dignity of 
commander. Stewart, whose mother was a Hamilton, was 
raised to their Earldom of Arran. 

32. Raid of Ruthven. — Certain of the old nobles, who 
were displeased and alarmed by the power exercised by these 
upstarts, bound themselves together to displace them both, 
and to get the King by a bond into their own power. The 
time they chose for carrying out their plan was when the 
King went on a hunting party into the Highlands. The 
Earl of Gowrie, one of the confederates, son of that R*uthven 
who had played the chief part in the murder of Rizzio, in- 
vited him to the castle of Ruthven. James went, and found 
himself a prisoner in the hands of the barons, August 22, 
1 581. They then made him declare that he was well pleased 
with what they had done, and was not under any restraint. 
Lennox was ordered to leave the kingdom, and after wander- 
ing about in poverty and distress till the end of the year, he 
went back to France, where he died before long. But before 
the Ruthven Lords had been a year in power, another change 
came. The king escaped disguised as a groom, rode to St. 
Andrews, where the nobles who were not in the bond 
gathered round him in such force that the Confederates 
were obliged to yield. 

33. Fall of Gowrie. — At first James acted moderately and 
wisely, for he promised to pardon all those who had taken 
part in the Raid of Ruthven ; but when Arran got back his 
old power over him he turned about and declared them all 
traitors, who must submit to his grace. Upon this most of 
them fled to England, but Gowrie submitted to the King and 
was pardoned. Arran had however determined on his fall, 
and Gowrie was so much insulted and slighted at Court that 
he made up his mind to leave the country. Just before he 



vi. ] DEA TH OF MARY. 117 



sailed, he heard that his old comrades had contrived another 
plot, and he delayed his setting out in order to have a share 
in it. Before anything was done, news of it got abroad, 
Gowrie was seized and, after a very unjust trial, beheaded at 
Stirling. The other conspirators made off to England again 
and were outlawed, and their estates were forfeited. 

34. Fall of Arran. — Arran's triumph did not last long. A 
fray took place on the Border in which an Englishman, Lord 
Russell, was slain. Arran was accused of having been the 
chief cause in this affair, and he was ordered to withdraw 
from Court. Then the banished lords, thinking this a good 
opportunity for them to return, went northward, joined the 
Hamiltons and Maxwells on the Border, came to Stirling 
and made their way into the presence of the king, who was 
forced to seem pleased to see them, as they had eight thou- 
sand men to support them, November^ 1585. A Parliament 
was called soon after, in which three important pieces of 
business were done. Gowrie's children were restored to the 
honours forfeited by the treason of their father ; Arran was 
stripped of all his dignities, and a new league was made with 
England. 

35. Death of Mary. — The captive Queen, whose influence in 
the affairs of her own country had ceased with the surrender 
of Edinburgh, had, during her long imprisonment, been the 
cause of many plots against the peace of England and the 
life of Elizabeth. For her share in Babingtorfs Plot, the 
object of which was the assassination of Elizabeth, she was 
tried, found guilty, and condemned to death. She was be- 
headed at Fotheringhay, February 8, 1587. Though James 
made some show of feelings of grief and anger at the news 
of his mothers death, no steps were taken to avenge it, and 
the matter soon seemed to be forgotten. 

36. Marriage of the King. — As James was now of age, his 
counsellors were looking: about for a suitable wife for him. 



THE REFORMATION. [chap. 



Frederick the Second King of Denmark had lately sent offer- 
ing to pay up the money for which the Orkney and Shetland 
Isles had been given in pledge, and as Scotland had no wish 
to give them back, it was thought that the difficulty mighi 
be got over by choosing one of his daughters, who would 
most likely bring the islands as her dowry. This proposal 
was agreed to by Frederick. His daughter Anne was 
betrothed to James, and Keith, the Earl Marshal, was sent 
to Copenhagen to act as proxy for the King in the marriage 
ceremony and to bring home the bride. On their way home 
the wedding party were storm-stayed and obliged to put into 
a Norwegan Port, and the King, to the surprise of every one, 
suddenly made up his mind to go himself to fetch his bride. 
He joined her at Upslo, but as nothing could make him 
brave the long sea voyage again till the winter was over they 
returned together to Copenhagen, and did not come to Scot- 
land till the next spring, May I, 1590. 

37. Abolition of Episcopacy. — For some time the govern- 
ment and the church had been at variance about the bishops. 
The General Assembly of 1581 had declared the episcopal 
order to be contrary to the Word of God, and had adopted 
the Second Book of Discipline as the rule of the government 
of the Church. This book was drawn up by Andrew 
Melville, who had succeeded Knox as the spiritual leader of 
the reformed Church. He was a zealous presbyterian, and 
it was mainly owing to him that the Scottish Church adopted 
that form of church government. The Ruthven lords had 
been the champions of the presbyterian or no-bishop party, 
and, while they were in power, the ministers upheld by them 
had taken more and more authority upon themselves. In 
theory they placed the church far above the civil power, and 
they taught that the chief magistrate, the King, ought to be 
subject to them in all matters of conscience and religion. 
They also claimed the right of the old Church in interfering 



vi. ] ABOLITION OF EPISCOPA CY. 119 

with people s private affairs. Each minister looked on himself 
as bishop over his own flock, and would not submit to having 
any overseer set over him again. But, as the removal of the 
bishops as spiritual peers would have been the removal of one 
of the three Estates — that one too that had always been 
on the side of the crown— and as their existence served as 
a pretext to the nobles for drawing their revenues, it was 
clearly the interest both of the crown and of the nobles to 
maintain them. In 1588 Philip of Spain fitted out a great 
fleet for the invasion of England. This caused a great panic 
throughout Scotland. The people feared that Philip might 
conquer England and bring it again under the dominion of 
the Pope, in which case the subjection of Scotland must soon 
follow. The Covenant for the maintenance of the Protestant 
religion, which had been signed in 1581, was renewed and 
signed all over the land. So great was the dread of the 
bishop of Rome that the people looked on all bishops with 
suspicion, and in 1592 an act was passed by which the whole 
order was swept away and the presbyterian polity established. 
Thenceforth the church was to be governed by a series of 
courts, the members of which were presbyters. The ministers 
of several parishes formed a presbytery, these again were 
grouped together into synods, while supreme over all was the 
General Assembly, composed of ministers and lay elders from 
the several presbyteries, which was to meet once a year at 
Edinburgh, and at which the King or his commissioner was 
to be present. 

38. The Spanish Blanks. — Still a large party adhered to 
the old Church. The chiefs of this party were Hnntly in 
the north and the Maxwells on the Border. They were 
always suspected of scheming for its restoration, and, as 
the King could not or would not proceed against them, he 
was supposed to favour their plans. In 1 592 eight suspicious 
papers were seized on the person of George Kerr, the Lord 



120 THE REFORM A TION. [chap. 

Newbottle's brother, who was leaving Scotland by the western 
coast. These papers, called the Spanish blanks, were signed 
by Huntly, Errol, and Angus, but had no other writing on 
them. Kerr y after being put to the torture, declared that these 
b ank papers were to be filled up by two Jesuits who were 
commissioned to offer the services of the nobles who had 
signed them to the King of Spain, to aid him in the re-estab- 
lishment of the old religion. This discovery filled every one 
with horror. Angus was seized ; but as Huntly retreated to 
his own country in the north, Argyle, his rival in the High- 
lands, was sent with full power against him. The two 
armies met at Glenlivat, not far from the scene of the well- 
remembered fight of Ha?'law. Huntly had but two thousand 
men, raised chiefly in the northern Lowlands, but they de- 
feated Argyle's swarm of Highlanders, October 1 594. But the 
Romish party was too weak to follow up the victory, and 
in 1597 Huntly and Eirol publicly renounced their old faith, 
and joined the established Church. 

39. Religious Tumults.— The King and the Church were 
not long at peace. He called certain of their ministers to ac- 
count before the council for what they had said in the pulpit. 
The ministers looked upon this interference as an attack on 
their privileges. The people supported them, and the result 
was a riot, so serious that the Court had to flee to Linlithgow. 
Upon this the King threatened to take away the courts of 
justice from Edinburgh. The fear of this damped the spirit 
of the mob, and after the return of the Court the ministers 
who had withstood the King fled to England. The Estates 
soon after passed an act by which the King might confer 
on any minister the title of bishop or abbot, but only so as to 
give him a seat in Parliament ; the title was not to imply 
any lordship over his brethren. 

40. The Gowrie Plot. — On the morning of the fifth of 
August, 1600, as James was setting out hunting from Falk- 



VI.] THE GOWRIE PLOT. 121 

land Palace, he was met by Alexander Ruthven, the younger 
brother of the Earl of Gowrie, who told him with a great 
air of mystery that he had discovered a man burying a 
pot of money in a field, and that he thought the affair so 
suspicious that he had taken him prisoner, and begged the 
King to come to Gowrie House in Perth to see him. James 
went, taking with him Mar, Lennox, and about twenty other 
gentlemen. After dinner Alexander took the King aside, 
and, when his attendants missed him, they were told that he 
had gone back to Falkland. They were preparing to follow 
him there when some of them heard cries from a turret. 
They recognized the King's voice, and they presently saw his 
head thrust out of a window calling for help. They had much 
ado to make their way to him, but they found him at last in a 
small room struggling with Alexander, while a man dressed 
in armour was looking on. Alexander Ruthven and Gowrie 
were both killed in the scuffle which followed. A tumult 
rose in the town, for the Earl had been Provost and was 
very popular with the townsfolk, and the King and his fol- 
lowers had to make their escape by the river. The doom of 
traitors was passed on the dead men, and their name was 
proscribed, but, as no accomplice could be discovered, it was 
hard to say what was the extent or object of their plot. The 
whole affair was very mysterious, the only witnesses being the 
King himself and Henderson the man in armour. Some of 
the ministers thought it so suspicious that they refused to 
return thanks for the King's safety, as they thought the whole 
affair an invention of his own. Eight years later some letters 
were discovered in the hands of one Sprot, a notary at Eye- 
mouth, which threw some more light on the mystery. They 
were written by Lo^an of Restalrig, and revealed a plan 
between him and the Ruthvens for bringing some prisoner, 
who was not named, but might possibly be the King, to Fast 
Castle, a fortress belonging to Logan, standing on a rock at 



122 THE REFORMA TION. [chap. 

the entrance to the Forth. Sprot was found guilty of treason, 
and was put to death for not revealing all he knew about 
the plot long before. 

41. Union of the Crowns.— When Elizabeth died, James 
was the nearest heir to the throne of England by right of 
descent from Margaret, elder daughter of Henry the Seventh. 
But her right had been passed over by Henry the Eighth, 
who had in the will, which he was empowered by Parliament 
to make, settled the succession on the heirs of his younger 
sister, Mary. As it was politically convenient to the English 
Privy Council that James should succeed Elizabeth on her 
death, they sent off post haste to summon him to come and 
take the crown. His questionable right was made good by 
the voice of the people in his first Parliament. He entered 
London May 6, 1603. Hitherto he had had less money and 
less power than almost any other prince in Europe ; he now 
became suddenly one of the richest and most powerful among 
them. This union of the crowns made the third break in the 
history of Scotland. The gallant struggle for freedom which 
had drawn forth all the energies of the nation during the past 
three centuries was now over. It was now to be united to 
the powerful neighbour that had so long threatened its inde- 
pendence. The representative of the ancient royal Celtic 
line, which the national reverence for hereditary royalty had 
upheld unbroken through the strain of seven long minorities, 
now became king of the larger and richer kingdom of 
England, which had been ruled by one foreign dynasty after 
another ever since the Norman Conquest. 

42. State of the Nation. — In Scotland the feudal system 
was still unshaken. To it the great barons owed their power, 
and the Reformation, which in England had strengthened 
the crown, had in Scotland only thrown more wealth and 
more power into the hands of the nobles. Hitherto the people 
had been only dependents of the great feudal barons, whose 



vi.] STATE OF THE NATION. 123 

burthens they bore in return for their protection. Still they 
could not have been very badly off, for in Scotland there 
were no peasant wars, as in Fra7ice and England. It was 
the Reformation which first brought them out as a separate 
body in the state. Their condition was now much worse 
than it had formerly been. The crown brought its increased 
power to bear upon the nobles, who in their turn, slaves and 
flatterers at the foreign Court and tyrants at home, used their 
feudal rights for the oppression of the people, who could hope 
for no redress from their absent King. 

43. Summary. — We have, in this chapter, traced the pro- 
gress of the Reformation, and noted the changes which it made 
in the state of the nation. Though the Reformation did not 
begin so soon in Scotland as in Germany and England, it 
made more striking changes and overthrew the old Church 
more completely than it did in either of those countries. It 
first gave to the people an independent national life. Until 
it roused them to separate action, they had been swayed by 
no party feelings, but had blindly followed the lead and fought 
in the feuds of their feudal superiors, without paying any heed 
to the cause for which they laid down their lives. The Refor- 
mation also broke off the alliance with France which had 
subsisted ever since the War of Independence. All the events 
of this period are closely connected with the change of re- 
ligion, and it is marked by more civil war, more bloodshed, 
more crimes of violence, more party strife, more treachery 
and wrong and robbery, than any other period in the history 
of Scotland. It was the bad faith of Mary of Lorraine which 
first drove the Reformers to take up arms in defence of their 
opinions. Under their own native queen they hoped to 
enjoy liberty of conscience, and as they looked to her to 
redress their grievances they welcomed her return with much 
loyal feeling. By the craftiness and dissimulation of her 
policy in public affairs, and by the scandals of her private life, 



124 THE REFORMATION. [chap. 

she changed their loyal affection into loathing and contempt, 
and finally forfeited the crown. During the long minority 
which followed, the country was desolated by a civil war, and 
the crown was impoverished by the grasping greediness of 
the nobles. When the King came of age, he showed himself 
quite unequal to the task of ruling and uniting the different 
rival factions in the church and in the state, and allowed 
himself to be governed by one worthless favourite after 
another. Nor were the ecclesiastical affairs of this period at 
all more settled than the secular. The form of church govern- 
ment was changed four times before the presbyterian polity 
was finally established in 1592. The lands of the old Church 
had been seized by the most worthless of the nobles instead 
of being set apart for the support of the new Church, so that 
the ministers could with difficulty secure a bare subsistence. 
During such an unhappy state of affairs there could be little 
social or intellectual developement. There were however 
among the Reformers many men distinguished for their 
learning and brilliant talents. Of these the most conspicuous 
were George Buchanan, tutor to the young king, who wrote 
a fabulous history of Scotland and other books in very 
elegant Latin, and John Knox, who wrote a History of the 
Reformation, remarkable for the vigour, clearness, and sim- 
plicity of its style. Sir James Melville, who was also an 
accomplished courtier, and stood high in favour both with 
Mary and with James, gives an excellent picture of these 
disturbed times in his very entertaining memoirs. The 
Prayer Book of the Reformed Church was also translated 
into Gaelic. It was published in 1567, and was the first 
Celtic book that had ever yet been printed. 



vii.] JAMES VI 125 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. 

James VI. ; results of the Union (1) — restoration of Episcopacy (2) 
— planting of the Highlands (3) — Articles of Perth (4) —founding 
of Nova Scotia (5) — the King s death (6) — Charles I. : resumption of 
benefices (7) — King's visit and coronation (8) — Book of Canons (9) 
— Liturgy tumults (10) — the Tables (11) — renewal of the Covenant 
(12)— Hamilton Commissioner (13) — Glasgow Assembly (14) — 
war in the north (15)— pacification of Berwick (16) — Assembly 
and Parliament ( 1 7) — invasion of England ( 1 8) — Treaty of Ripon 
(19) — war breaks out (20) — Montrose's campaign (21) — dealings 
with the king (22) — the Engagement ; Whiggamores* raid (23) — 
Directory ; cojifession of faith (24) — the king's death (25) — Charles 
II; fate of Hamilton and Huntly (26) — Montrose's rising (27) — 
arrival of Charles (28) — Cromwell's conquest (29) — the coronation 
(30) — battle of Worcester (31) — union with England (32) — Glen- 
cairns expedition (33) — the Restoration (34) — episcopacy re-estab- 
lished '(35)— fate of Guthrie and Argyle (36) — the Ejection (37) — 
western rising (38) — the Persecution (39) — the Indulgence (40)— 
murder of Sharp (41) — Sanquhar Declaration (42) — Drumdog 
(43) — Bothzvell Bridge (44) — Test Act (45)— Argyle 's opposition 
(46) — James VII; the Killing Time (47) — Argyle' s rising (48) — 
the Indulgence (49) — deposition of James (50) — William and Mary; 
the Convention (51) — //$£ Rabbling (52) — Dundee's revolt (53) — 
&*#/<? <?/" Killiecrankie (54) — attack of Dunkeld ; Buchan's 
attempt (55) — dealings with the chiefs (56) — Massacre of Glencoe 
(57) — Darien Scheme (58) — William's death (59) — Education 
Act (60) — Anne; Act of Security (61) — /rw/ and death of Captain 
G)-een (62) — ///<? Union (63) — literature and art (64) — summary 
(65). 

I. James VI., 1603-1625. Results of the Union. — Im- 
mediately after the Union of the Crowns, the Border laws 
on each side were repealed, and it was settled that subjects 



126 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 



of either country born after the Union should no longer be 
looked on as aliens in the other, but should have the undis- 
puted right of inheriting property in either. A Lord High 
Commissioner was appointed to represent the King in Scot- 
land, and there was some talk of an union of the parlia- 
ments, but it was not carried out. 

2. Restoration of Episcopacy. — The great desire of the 
King was to bring the Church of Scotland into conformity 
with the Church of England. To bring this about, he sum- 
moned some of the ministers to England, in the hope that 
he should be able to persuade them to agree with him. 
Melville, their leader, spoke out so plainly against episcopacy 
before the bishops in the Privy Council that he was sent to 
the Tower and finally banished. But the King carried his 
point, and in 1606 the Estates passed an act for the restora- 
tion of the bishops. No acts of church government were 
in future to be lawful without their consent, and though 
the General Assembly was still to go on, its power was to 
be very much lessened. As the old line of Scottish bishops 
had died out, John Spottiswood, Andrew Lamb, and Gavin 
Hamilton were consecrated by English bishops at London 
House to the bishoprics of Glasgow, Brechin, and Galloway. 
To avoid all dispute about the old claim of supremacy, 
neither of the English archbishops was present. But these 
bishops had a very hard time of it, for they did not get the 
lands of their sees restored to them as had been pro- 
mised, and many of them had hard work to get a living at all. 
In 1 610, two Courts of High Commission were set up. These 
courts were afterwards united into one, but, as this court was 
under the control of the Court of Session, it could never be so 
tyrannical as the Court of High Commission in England. 

3. Planting of the Highlands. — In the early part of his 
reign James had tried to do something to improve the state of 
the Highlands. To this end three new burghs were founded, 



vii.] PLANTING OF THE ISLANDS. 127 

and the lands of all chiefs who could not show written 
titles were declared forfeited. These lands were given to Low- 
land colonists, who were however soon glad to give up any 
attempt at settling among their lawless neighbours. The 
MacGregors, whose district lay close on the Lowland border, 
had shown themselves the most savage and lawless of all the 
Highland clans. Argyle was commissioned to hunt them 
down, but they beat the Lowlanders with great slaughter in 
a battle at Glen Frui7i in 1604. Their chief was afterwards 
taken and hanged, and the name proscribed, but that was 
only breaking the power of one clan, whilst the others re- 
remained as formidable as ever. To prevent such outbreaks 
in future, Argyle and Huntlywere entrusted with full powers 
to carry on the planting of the Highlands. Three condi- 
tions were required of those chiefs who were suffered to stay 
in possession of their lands. That they should give sureties 
for the good order of th^ir clans : promise to Jet their land 
for a fixed rent in money instead of all other exactions, and 
agree to send their children to school in the Lowlands 
These changes not only strengthened the Government, 
but made united action on the part of the clans more 
difficult. 

4. Articles of Perth. — The King only paid one visit to 
Scotland after his accession to the throne of England. He 
then gave great offence by introducing ceremonial vestments 
at the service in his own chapel. These vestments and other 
ornaments which were customary in England were hateful to 
the presbyterians. The passing of the " Five Articles" by a 
General Assembly held at Perth completed their dismay, 
and plainly showed the King's intention to impose upon 
them the ceremonies which they so much disliked. By th< se 
Articles the private administration of the sacraments was 
allowed, all persons were enjoined to kneel at the Sacrament 
of the Lord's Supper, to bring their children to the Bishops 



128 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

for confirmation, and to observe the five great festivals of the 
Christian Church as holidays. 

5. Founding of Nova Scotia. — The poverty of their country 
and the love of adventure had made the Scots from the 
earliest times ever ready to seek their fortunes abroad. 
They had won themselves renown as soldiers or traders 
in nearly all the countries of the Old world, but they 
had not as yet any colony of their own in the New one. 
Hitherto these emigrants, though they were called Scots, 
had been chiefly Saxons from the Lowlands, but in the 
beginning of this reign bodies of Celts had gone back to the 
original Scotia, and in Ulster, their old home, they won 
back settlements from the kindred Celtic race who now 
looked On them as intruders. But while some of the wan- 
derers thus went back to the old country, others were found- 
ing a New Scotland beyond the sea. This, the third land 
to which the wandering people gave its name, was called 
by the Lati7i form of the name, Nova Scotia. It was granted 
by a Royal Charter to Sir William Alexander, afterwards 
Earl of Stirling, the projector of this scheme of emigration 
in 1 62 1. This new settlement was divided into 1,000 parts, 
and every adventurer who was willing to brave the hardships 
of an uncleared country, and resist the encroachments of 
the neighbouring settlers, was rewarded with the rank and 
title of baronet. About the same time too the Lowlanders 
were encouraged to go over to the North of Ireland, and to 
take up the lands from which the Irish chiefs had been 
driven. As the soil there was much better than that which 
they had left, they gladly agreed to the change, and passed 
over in great numbers, more than ten thousand going in two 
years. 

6. The King's Death. — On the twenty-seventh of March, 
1625, the King died. He had governed Scotland during his 
twenty-two years of absence with a much firmer hand than 



vii.] CHARLES I. 129 



in the troubled time of his personal rule. He had then 
been quite at the mercy of his ministers and of the nobles. 
The wealth and power of his larger kingdom made him 
now able to deal with the smaller one pretty much as he 
liked, and the nobles were too eagerly seeking favour and 
place at the richer court to be willing to risk the loss of them 
by opposing his will. James was quite unlike all his fore- 
fathers. He had good abilities and an unusual amount of 
learning, besides a good deal of common sense and shrewd- 
ness, which he sometimes made use of, but his repulsive appear- 
ance and manners, and his want of self-reliance, exposed 
him to ridicule and contempt. He had none of the courage, 
high spirit, graceful tastes and ready wit that spread a veil 
over the faults and vices of his ancestors. Yet he alone 
escaped the tragic fate that seemed the doom of all the 
Stewart line, and was singled out from among them for an 
almost fairy-like change and advance of fortune. 

7. Charles I,, 1625-1649. Resumption of Benefices. — 
Charles ) who succeeded J ames as King of the two kingdoms, 
had even more exalted ideas than his father of the power 
of the prerogative. It fell to the lot of the Scots to take 
the lead and set an example to the English in resisting 
his arbitrary measures. Before he had been a year on the 
throne, it was clear that he meant to carry out his father's 
plan of making the Scotch Church as like the English Church 
as possible. He issued a proclamation recalling all the church 
lands which were in the hands of laymen, whether they had 
been granted by the crown or not. The holders protested 
against this injustice, and at last a compromise was made by 
which they agreed to give up part of the lands they held on 
condition of having their claim to the rest made good. 

8. King's Visit and Coronation. — In 1633 Charles came to 
Scotland, and was crowned with great pomp in the Abbey 
church of Holyrood. The vestments that were worn on 

m K 



130 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

this occasion by the clergy gave great offence to the people. 
Their discontent was increased by an order from the King 
enjoining their own ministers to wear surplices, and the 
bishops to wear rochets and sleeves, instead of the Geneva 
cloak as heretofore. While Charles was in Scotland, a meet- 
ing of the Estates was held, in which he met with no oppo- 
sition, owing to a new arrangement in choosing the Lords of 
the Articles. Formerly this committee had consisted of 
eight members from each Estate chosen by their own peers ; 
but now the bishops were first chosen, they again chose the 
barons, and barons and bishops together chose the commons, 
so that all those chosen were really the allies of the bishops. 
A supplication was drawn up to remonstrate with the King 
about this interference, but, instead of taking it in good part. 
Charles was very angry, treated their remonstrance as a politi- 
cal offence, and put the lord Balmerinoch, who had revised the 
supplication which was presented to him, in prison. He was 
afterwards pardoned, but this did not make the King any 
more popular, as it was thought that he had only liberated 
Balmerinoch from fear and not from goodwill. While in Scot- 
land he founded a new bishopric at Edinburgh, which had 
formerly formed part of the diocese of St. Andrews. 

9. Book of Canons. — The discontent and distrust of the 
people which had been roused by the introduction of vest- 
ments, by the increase in the number of the bishops, and by 
the appointment of the primate as chancellor were now 
brought to a head by the appearance of a s Book of Canons, or 
rules for the government of the Church. This book they 
were called on to accept in place of the Book of Discipline, 
on the authority of the King alone, unconfirmed by the 
Estates, and not long after the King attempted to change 
their form of worship as well. Through the influence of 
Laud, Archbishop of Ca?iterbury, a Liturgy was drawn up 
on the plan of the first book of Edward the Sixth. From 



vil] BOOK OF CANONS. 131 

this Liturgy the Scotch clergy were commanded by the King 
to read prayers in the churches, instead of from the book 
of Common Order which was still in general use. 

10. Liturgy Tumults. — The imposition of this book roused 
the old national jealousy. The people thought that to have an 
English service book forced upon them would be a mark of 
subjection ; and on the day named by the King for bringing it 
into use, July 16, 1637, when the Dean of Edinburgh tried to 
read the prayers from it in St. ales' Church, a riot broke out. 
Stools and books were thrown at the Dean, the Archbishop, 
and the Bishop of Edinburgh, who had great difficulty in 
escaping out of the hands of the mob. And this tumult wan 
but a sign of the common feeling throughout the country. 
The King was highly incensed and ordered the offenders to 
be brought to punishment, and the use of the liturgy to 
be enforced. Numberless petitions against it from all ranks 
of the people poured in on the Privy Council, or were sent 
up to London to the King, while Edinburgh was thronged 
with the petitioners from all parts of the country waiting 
for the answer which they hoped would be favourable. No 
answer was given to them, but the King issued a proclama- 
tion ordering them all to return to their homes, and threat- 
ening to remove the courts from Edinburgh to Linlithgow 
if the disturbance continued, as had been done in the late 
reign. But this had no effect. The bishops and the other 
members of the Council were mobbed, and the supplicants 
joined in a common petition to the King, called the Great 
Supplication. 

1 1. The Tables. — The Council finding it impossible to treat 
with a turbulent mob which increased instead of diminishing, 
persuaded the malcontents to choose representatives to act 
in their names, four from each class, nobles, lesser barons t 
clergy, and burgesses. The rest were to return peaceably to 
their several homes. But this committee, known as The 

K 2 



132 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

Tables, gave the Council more trouble than the unruly mob 
had done, for they made their way into the Council chamber, 
insisted on debating there, and demanded that the bishops 
should be turned out. 

12. Renewal of the Covenant, 1638. — Still the King would 
not give in, and he met a less submissive protest on the 
part of his subjects by another threatening proclamation. 
On this the Tables renewed the Covenant, with a clause 
added to it aimed at the bishops. At the last renewal of 
the Covenant, only notable persons had put their names to it, 
but this time it was signed by every one throughout the land, 
rich and poor alike. There was the greatest excitement 
and enthusiasm about it all over the country, and from this 
time the popular party became known as the Cove- 
nanters. 

1 3. Hamilton Commissioner.- — A few months later the Mar- 
quess of Hamilton came to Scotland as Com?nissione7' with 
full power, it was said, to settle everything. The demands of 
the Covenanters were that the Court of High Commission, 
the Canons and the Liturgy should all be done away, and 
that a free Assembly and a free Parliament should be sum- 
moned. But Hamilton, acting on the orders given him, 
kept putting them off with promises till the King should be 
ready to put them down by force, when suddenly the King 
turned about, promised all they asked, and agreed that the 
Assembly should be called, and that the bishops should be 
tried by it. 

14. Glasgow Assembly. — The Assembly met in the Cathe- 
dral Church at Glasgow, November 21, 1638. Hamilton 
opened it as the Royal Co?nmissioner. But after a few days, 
when the attack on the bishops began, he withdrew and 
ordered the members to disperse. They paid no heed to this 
order, but went on with the trial of the bishops, who were all 
deposed, and eight of them excommunicated. The Canons 



vil] WAR IN THE NORTH. 1 33 

and the Liturgy were then rejected, and all acts of the 
Assemblies held since 1606 were annulled. 

15. War in the North.— In the North, where Huntly was 
the King's Lieutenant, the Covenant had not been received, 
and the Tables resolved to enforce it with the sword. Scot- 
land was now full of trained soldiers just come back from Ger- 
many , where they had learnt to fight in the Thirty Years 
war, and as plenty of money had been collected among the 
Covenanters, an army was easily raised. Their banner bore 
the motto, For Religion, the Covenant, a?id the Country, 
and their leader was James Graham, Earl of Montrose, one 
of the most zealous among the champions of the cause. Aber- 
deen, Huntly's capital, dared make no resistance, for the 
soldiers occupied the town and the ministers the pulpits, and 
Montrose brought Huntly himself back to Edinburgh in his 
train. But in the first brush of actual war the King's party, the 
Cavaliers, or Malignants as their opponents called them, had 
the advantage, for they surprised and scattered the Cove- 
nanters of the North at the little village of Turriff, which 
they had made their trysting place. In this action, called 
the Trot of Turriff, the first blood was shed in the great 
Civil War. The Cavaliers were the first to draw the sword. 
Though Huntly had been taken out of the way by his re- 
moval to Edinburgh, his two sons, the Lord Aboyne and 
Lewis Gordon, supplied his place and called out the High- 
landers. Aberdeen changed hands, and again Montrose was 
sent to subdue the North before the expected struggle with 
England should begin. At the Bridge of Dee he defeated 
the Malignants, and once more entered Aberdeen in triumph. 
Just after this entry the news was brought that peace had 
been made between the King and the other army of the 
Covenant on the Border. June 1639. 

16. Pacification of Berwick. — While Montrose had been 
thus busy for the Covenant in the North, the King had been 



134 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap, 

making ready to put down his rebellious Scottish subjects 
with the sword. Early in May a fleet entered the Forth 
under the command of Haiiiilton. But the Tables took pos- 
session of the strongholds, and seized the ammunition which 
had been laid in for the King. They then raised another 
army of twenty-two thousand foot and one thousand two 
hundred horse, and placed at its head Alexander Leslie, a 
veteran, trained in the Gei'man war. Their army they sent 
southwards to meet the English host which the King was 
bringing to reduce Scotland. The two armies faced each 
other on opposite banks of the Tweed. The Scots were skil- 
fully posted on Dunse Law, a. hill commanding the Northern 
road. To pass them without fighting was impossible, and 
to fight would have been almost certain defeat. The King 
seeing this agreed to treat. By a treaty called the " Pacifi- 
cation of Berwick? it was settled that the questions at 
issue between the King and the Covenanters should be put 
to a free Assembly, that boih armies should be disbanded, 
and that the strongholds should be restored to the King. 
June 9, 1639. 

17. Assembly and Parliament. — The Assembly which met 
at Edinburgh repeated and approved all that had been 
done at Glasgow. When the Estates met for the first 
time in the New Parliament-house, June 2, 1640, they went 
still further, for they not only confirmed the Acts of the 
Assemblies, but ordered everyone to sign the Covenant 
under pain of civil penalties. Now for the first time they 
acted in open defiance of the King, to whom hitherto they 
had professed the greatest loyalty and submission. Three 
times had they been adjourned by the King, who had also 
refused to see the Commissioners whom they sent up to 
London. Now they met in spite of him, and, as in former 
times of troubles and difficulties, they appealed to France 
tor help. When this intrigue with the French was found 



vil.] INVASION OF ENGLAND. 135 

out, the Lord Loudon, one of their Commissioners, was sent 
to the Tower, and the English parliament was summoned 
to vote supplies for putting down the Scots by force of arms. 
But by this time the English were beginning to see that the 
cause of the Scots was the cause of freedom. There was 
much difficulty in raising an army to march against them, 
and when raised it was discontented and mutinous. 

18. Invasion of England. — As for the Scots they mus- 
tered stronger than before, and, on August 20, 1640, they 
crossed the Tweed, and entered England. At Newburn they 
defeated a body of English, and crossing the Tyne, marched 
on to Newcastle, which yielded to them without offering 
resistance. They then took Durhain, Tynemouth, and 
Shields without a struggle. Meanwhile news came from 
Scotland that the two great strongholds of the East and of 
the West, Edinburgh and Dunbarton, had again fallen into 
their hands. 

19. Treaty of Ripon. — Once more they sent to the King, who 
was then at York, a supplication in which they declared that 
all they wanted was satisfaction to their just demands. The 
King laid the matter before a great council of peers which he 
had called at York. By their advice it was decided to treat 
with the Scots. Eight Commissioners from their army came 
to Ripon, and the treaty which was begun there was not 
ended until nearly a year afterwards at Lo?ido?i. All that 
they asked was granted, and they were promised three 
hundred thousand pounds to defray the expenses of this 
war, into which they said they had been driven. The armies 
were then disbanded, and peace seemed to be restored. The 
King came to Scotland once more, and a meeting of the 
Estates was held in which he let the members have their 
own way in everything. He also confirmed the right of the 
Estates to meet once every three years, and fixed the next 
meeting for June, 1644. 



136 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

20. Breaking out of the War — This seeming peace was 
but the lull before the storm, and, before one year had passed, 
the English had followed the example set them by the Scots 
in resisting the unlawful exactions of the King ; the Long 
Parlia?nent had brought his minister Strafford, the chief 
agent of his despotism, to the scaffold, and had called on the 
people to arm in defence of their rights and liberties. When 
the great Civil War began in earnest, each side was eager to 
secure the help of the fine army which the Scots had at their 
command. Religious opinion decided the matter. The Par- 
liament, which was as much opposed to episcopacy as the Scots 
were, adopted the solemn League and Covenant, and ordered 
every one to sign it, and by so doing induced the Scots to 
join them. The army was raised again, and put under the 
command of the two Leslies, Alexander, now Earl of Leven, 
and his nephew David, who soon proved the better soldier of 
the two. A second time they entered England, January 19, 
1644, and leaving a part of their force to besiege Newcastle 
marched on into Yorkshii'e, and joined the troops of the 
Parliament in time to share their victory at Marston Moor. 
Newcastle was taken by storm, October 19. 

21. Montrose's Campaign. — Meanwhile Montrose, whose 
zeal for the Covenant had now changed into zeal for the King, 
was taking advantage of the absence of the Covenanting 
force in England to win back the North for Charles with 
an army of Celts alone. It was the first time that the High- 
landers had been turned to account in regular war. Hitherto 
they had been thought only capable of preying upon one 
another, but now, under a General who knew how to handle 
them, they did wonders. The Lowlanders who had hastily 
mustered to oppose them were beaten at Tippermuir. 
Montrose then took Perth, marched northward, again de- 
feated the Covenanters, took Aberdeen once more, and held 
for the King this town which twice before he had held for 



vii.] MONTROSE'S CAMPAIGN. 137 

the Covenant. He then turned to the West, wasted the 
country of his great enemy Ai'gyle, pounced down upon 
and scattered the force gathered to oppose his own on the 
shore of Loch Linnhe ; kept his army in the Highlands 
during the winter, and early in the spring took Dundee. He 
twice defeated the Covenanters in the country north of the 
Forth, and once south of it at Kilsyth. Thus in a wonderfully 
short time he won back nearly the whole country for the 
King. But the secret of his success had lain in the rapid 
marches and sudden attacks that kept his men busy. When 
the fighting was over, the Highlanders, as was their wont, 
went off in large numbers to take home their spoil. In 
this way his army was diminished. David Leslie, who had 
been summoned home to oppose him, brought some cavalry 
from the southern army against his weakened force, and 
won a complete victory at Philiphaugh, near Selkirk, Sep- 
tember 1 2th, 1645. Montrose retreated with the small rem- 
nant that was left to him, but he found it impossible to re- 
assemble his scattered force. His campaign had lasted little 
more than a year, and a few months later the King, who 
had thrown himself on the protection of the Scots army at 
Newark, ordered him to lay down his arms. Montrose obeyed 
and left the country. 

22. Dealings with the King. — While the Scots army was 
lying before Newark, Charles, whose cause was now nearly 
hopeless, secretly left Oxfoi'd, where he was besieged by 
the army of the Parliament, and sought protection in the 
camp of the Scots. A few days afterwards Newark sur- 
rendered, and they returned with the King to Newcastle. 
He stayed in their hands eight months. During ihis time, 
though they behaved towards him with respect and courtesy, 
he was really their prisoner, and they were busy treating 
with the Parliament for the terms of his surrender. If he 
had turned Presbyterian and signed the Covenant, no doubt 



138 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

they would have protected him, but after many arguments 
with Henderson , a noted divine of their party, he still re- 
mained unconvinced. In the end they agreed to leave 
England on payment of 400,000 pounds arrears of pay 
that were due to them. When they returned to their own 
country, they left the King to the mercy of the English 
Parliament. 

23. The Engagement. — A few months later, when Charles 
was a prisoner at Carisbrooke, he made a secret treaty with 
the moderate party in Scotland, to the effect that, if they 
would help him to win back his power, he would confirm the 
Covenant and would make a trial of the presbyterian Church 
in England. On this the Committee of Estates, in whose 
hands the government was, raised an army and sent it into 
England, with Hamilton, who had been created a Duke, 
at its head. They were defeated at Preston by Oliver 
Cromwell, lieutenant-general of the parliamentary army. The 
Duke marched on to Uttoxeter. There he and his army laid 
down their arms, and yielded themselves prisoners, August 25, 
1648. But the extreme party in Scotland were very wroth 
against the Engagers, as they called those who had made 
this "engagement" with the King. They thought that the 
taking of the Covenant by the King was a mere pretence, 
and that Hamilton's expedition was a sinful helping of the 
Maligna?ils. A change in the government was the result. 
Argyle, the head of the extreme Covenanters, raised his 
followers, while from the Western Lowlands, which were just 
waking to zeal for the Covenant, a body of men, with Lord 
Eglinton at their head, marched on Edinburgh. This was 
called the Whigga mores' Raid, from Whig, a word used 
in the Westland for urging on horses. This was the 
origin of the word Whig, which gradually became the nick- 
name of a political party. Argyle and his party came to 
terms with Cromwell, and formed a new Committee of 



vil] THE KING'S DEATH. 139 

Estates. Cromwell then marched to Edinburgh, and mad? 
them give him an assurance that none of the Engagers 
should be allowed to take any part in the government. By 
the Act of Classes which was then passed, all profane 
persons and enemies of the Covenant were likewise shut 
out from holding office. 

24. The Directory and Confession of Faith. — The Scots 
now hoped to see their Church and their Covenant adopted 
over all three kingdoms. In this hope they were disappointed, 
for the most of the parliamentary party were Independents, 
who had no idea of exchanging the tyranny of bishops for 
that of presbyters. An Assembly of Divines met at West- 
minster, June 12, 1643, to settle religious matters. They 
adopted the Covenant, and the Scots in return accepted their 
directory of public worship, and the Confession of Faith 
drawn up by them in place of their own Books of Discipline 
and Common Order. But though the Covenant was thus no- 
minally accepted in England, the different English sects were 
allowed far more liberty than the strict Covenanters thought 
right. 

25. The King's Death.— On the thirtieth of January, 1649, 
the King was beheaded at Whitehall. With the court of 
justice which professed to try him, with the sentence which 
it passed, and with the execution of that sentence, the Scots 
had nothing whatever to do. As they had no idea of the 
existence of their kingdom without a king, nor of having 
any other king than the hereditary one, no sooner was the 
news of the King's death known in Edinburgh, than Charles 
his son was proclaimed King of Great Britai?i i Fra?ice, and 
Ireland. 

26. Charles II., 1649- 1685. Fate of Hamilton and 
Huntly. — Hamilton, who was a prisoner in England, was 
brought to trial as an English subject by his English title of 
Earl of Cambridge 1 he was found guilty of treason in invading 



140 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

the country, and was beheaded. Hiintly met with a like fate 
in Scotland. He was also charged with treason in having 
made war for the King against the Covenanters. 

27. Montrose's Rising. — Meanwhile in the north Montrose 
made one more effort for the king. With a small army of 
foreigners which he had gathered on the Conti?ient he landed 
in Orkney, and from thence passed over to Scotland early in 
1650. But his followers were dispersed by a detachment from 
the Covenanting army. He himself wandered for a while 
in the Highlands, but was at last taken prisoner, brought to 
Edinburgh, and hanged there without a trial. He was lying 
under sentence of death for treason, which had been passed 
against him five years before, when he first took up arms for 
the King. 

28. Arrival of Charles. — But while the Estates were thus 
dealing with the leaders of the Malignants, they were busy 
on their own account treating for the return of Charles 
They looked on him as their lawful King, and they we*e 
ready to be faithful to him if he would sign the Covenant 
and promise to submit to the dictates of the Assembly. 
These promises he made, and, before he landed, he signed 
the Covenant, in July, 1650, while the courtiers whom he had 
brought with him were nearly all sent away as being either 
Malignants or Engagers. 

29. Cromwell's Conquest. — No sooner did the news of 
these doings reach London than Cromwell 'was sent northward 
with a large army to put a stop to them. The old hatred of 
England was rekindled by this invasion, and numbers of 
recruits flocked round the banner of the Covenant. The army 
thus brought together was made up of good soldiers who 
made no pretences to piety, and of would-be saints who knew 
nothing of fighting. But the saints drove from their ranks 
all whom they suspected of lukewarmness in the cause and 
therefore looked on as sinners, and thus weeded out their 



vii.] CROMWELVS CONQUEST. 141 

best soldiers. Those who were left were put under the com* 
mand of Leslie, and the King was not suffered to go out with 
the host. They took up a strong position on the hills south 
of the Firth of Forth, and for some time Cromwell tried in 
vain to bring them to a battle, but at last Leslie was per- 
suaded against his better judgment to go down into the 
plain and meet the enemy. A battle was fought near 
Dunbar, September 3, in which the Scots were thoroughly 
beaten. 

30. The Coronation. — Meanwhile Charles was in Dunferm- 
line, in old times the royal city, under care so strict and 
watchful that it was very much like imprisonment. The life 
which he led there was so distasteful to him that he made 
his escape, in hopes of joining the northern chiefs. But 
thcr plans were badly laid. He found no one to meet him 
as he had expected, and he was pursued and brought back by 
his former guardians. According to the ancient custom, 
Charles was crowned at Scone by the hands of the Marquess 
of Argyle. 

31. Battle of Worcester. — While Cromwell was busy in 
Scotland the Scots army marched, into England. This 
time they took the King with them. But Cromwell hastened 
after them, came up with them at Worcester, and defeated 
them there, September 3, 165 1, exactly a year after his 
victory at Dunbar. This was the last battle fought in the 
Civil War. The Scots had been the first to take up the 
sword, and they were the last to lay it down. Charles, after 
wandering about for some time in danger, and in want, 
escaped to the Continent. Meanwhile General Monk, who 
had been left in Scotland with an army of five thousand 
men, was reducing the country to subjection. The public 
records deposited in Stirling Castle were sent to the Tower 
of London. The Regalia, the Honours of Scotland as they 
were called, the Crown, the Sword, and the Sceptre, had 



142 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

been taken to Dunnottar, one of the strong fortresses in 
Scotland, which stood on a ledge of rock overhanging the 
sea. The Castle made a gallant resistance, but was at last 
obliged to yield, but the Honours were not found in it. They 
had been taken secretly from the Castle by Mrs. Granger, the 
wife of the minister of the parish. She rode through the 
camp with the Crown on her lap hidden in a bundle of lint, 
and the sceptre in her hand in the guise of a distaff, with 
the flax she was spinning wound round it. She and her 
husband buried the Honours under the floor of the church, 
and they kept their secret so well that no one knew what 
had become of them. 

32. Union with England. — Cromwell, now Lord Protector 
of England, Scotland, and Ireland, set to work to carry 
out Edward the First's idea of a legislative union of England 
and Scotland. This Union was ratified by the Council, in 
1654. It was then settled that Scotland should be repre- 
sented by thirty members in the English Parliament. Free- 
trade was established between the two countries. Great 
changes were also made in the Church Government. The 
Assembly was closed, and the power of the Church-courts 
was done away with. The country was divided into five 
districts, and the care of providing ministers to the different 
parishes was laid upon a certain number of ministers to be 
chosen from these districts. In order to improve the state 
of the people, all feudal dues were taken away. A fixed rent 
in money was substituted for all the services and restrictions 
to which the land had hitherto been liable. The Highlands 
were kept in order by the founding of garrisoned Forts. 

33. Glencairn's Expedition. — Once only was the peace and 
order thus well established broken in favour of the Stewarts. 
A rising was made in the Highlands by William Cunningham^ 
Lord Glencaim, who acted under a commission from Charles. 
More than five thousand men gathered round him. They 



VII.] EPISCOPACY RE-ESTABLISHED. 143 

were dispersed by a detachment of Monk's troops under 
General Morgan at Loch Garry before they had come down 
from the Highlands. 

34. The Restoration. — The Protector, whose conquest had 
made Scotland prosperous, died September 3, 1658. His son 
Richard succeeded him in office, but he was not strong enough 
to keep order, as his father had done. A time of great 
confusion followed, which ended in the recall and Restoration 
of Charles. This was chiefly the work of General Monk. 
He was Commander of the Army in Scotland, during the 
Protectorate. Some time after Cromwell's death he called 
together a Convention of the Representatives of the Counties. 
Whether they knew of his intention of restoring Charles 
or not is not certain. But they aided him with a large sum 
of money. In November, 1659, he set out with the army for 
London, and in about six months' time Charles returned in 
triumph to England. In Scotland, where Charles had 
been already crowned, his return was celebrated with great 
rejoicings by the people, who hoped that he would uphold 
the Covenant which he had signed. Before long, they found 
out how much they had been mistaken. In the very first 
English Parliament, an Act was passed which took from 
Scotland the privilege of free-trade with England, which she 
had enjoyed under Cromwell. This was the Navigation 
Act, by which the exporting and importing of merchandise 
into England, or any of her colonies, was forbidden to any 
but English vessels. 

35. Episcopacy Re-established. — yohn Middleton, a. sol- 
dier of fortune, who had been taken prisoner at Worcester, 
and who had afterwards taken an active part in Glencaim's 
expedition, was now made Earl of Middleton, and was sent 
to Scotland as Commissioner. When the Estates met, an 
Act called the Act Rescissory was passed. By this Act, 
all the Acts passed since 1633 where cut out of the Statutes ; 



144 THE UVION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 



nearly all the concessions wrung from Charles the First 
were recalled. The causes of dispute between the King and 
the people were thus restored to the state in which they had 
been before the great struggle began. In this same year 
Episcopacy was re-established by the Estates, and the Cove- 
nant was publicly burned by the hangman. As there was 
but one of the old bishops still alive, three new ones were 
consecrated in England. James Sharp was the Primate. 
He had gone up to London to plead the cause of the Cove- 
nant and of Presbyters ; he came back an Archbishop, and 
was thenceforward foremost in persecuting the cause he had 
deserted. 

36. Fate of Argyle and of Guthrie. — The government 
of Scotland was entrusted to a Privy Council. Its authority 
was supported by a standing lifeguard, the troop that former 
kings had often asked for in vain. To this Council were 
entrusted the supreme powers of the Estates during the 
intervals between the Sessions. An Act of Indemnify 
was promised, but before it was passed several persons 
suffered death. Two of those who thus fell were specially 
distinguished. The one was Argyle, whose great power 
made him a dangerous rival to the King. He was treache- 
rously seized in London, whither he had gone to pay his court 
to Charles. He was sent down to Edinburgh, where he was 
tried for treason, found guilty, and beheaded, May 27, 166 1. 
But the victim who was most regretted and whose fate called 
forth the most pity was James Guthrie, a noted divine, the 
leader of the extreme party among the Covenanters. This 
party, who were called the Remonstrants, had prepared \a 
Remonstrance to be presented to the King directly after his 
return, praying that no form of worship but their own might 
be suffered within the realm. This remonstrance was drawn 
up by Guthrie. It was never presented, and those who had 
projected it were put in prison. Guthrie was now brought 



vii. 1 THE EJECTION. 145 

to trial on a charge of spreading abroad sedition and treason 
against the Government. He refused any legal defence, and 
avowed and justified all that he had done. He was found 
guilty and beheaded. He was looked on by the Covenanters 
as a martyr for his faith, and his last words were treasured 
up with special veneration. 

37. The Ejection. — The promised Act of Indemnity was 
not passed till 1662, and it was not a free pardon, as had 
been looked for. Between seven and eight hundred persons 
were heavily fined. In this same year an Act was passed 
requiring all persons holding any public office to sign a 
Declaration that the Covenant was an unlawful oath ; and 
lastly a law was passed that all ministers presented to livings 
since 1639 should be turned out, unless they would agree to 
be collated or instituted by the new bishops. The ministers 
who refused to consent to episcopal collation were required 
to remove with their families out of their parishes within 
a month from the date of the passing of this Act. The 
meeting of the Council in which it was passed was called 
the Drunken Parliament, from the condition of the mem- 
bers present. Sooner than submit to this, three hundred 
and fifty ministers resigned. Most of their parishioners 
followed them, and the churches were left empty, while the 
people flocked to the open-air services of their former 
pastors. To prevent this an Act was passed for levying 
fines on all persons who did not go to their parish church 
on the Lord's Day. Another Act, called the Mile Act, was 
also passed, which forbade the recusant or refusing ministers 
to come within twenty miles of their former parishes, or 
within three miles of any royal burgh. The Court of High 
Cotnmission was revived, and empowered to proceed against 
all dissenters from the Episcopal (now the Established) 
Church, whether they were Romanists or Presbyterians, 
But this tyranny drove the people to revolt, and a third 
M L 



146 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

Religious War began. In the first the people had taken up 
arms for a question of doctrine ; the second arose from dis- 
putes about a form of prayer ; this, the third, was caused by- 
enforcing a form of Church-government specially disliked by 
the nation. In the conduct of public prayer no change was 
made. As there had been in James's reign a Presbyterian 
Church with a Liturgy, so now there was an Episcopal 
Church without one. But, though the cause of dispute 
seemed this time of less importance than in the two former 
wars, the zeal on the one side and the persecution on the 
other were greater than they had been in the former struggles. 
Then Edinburgh and the Eastern Lowlands had borne the 
brunt of the battle ; now it was in the West, where it was 
latest kindled, that religious zeal flamed fiercest and lasted 
longest. 

38. Western Rising. — In spite of fines and penalties the 
churches still remained empty, while the people went long 
distances to gather round their " outed " ministers. On the 
hill-sides, wherever in short they were least likely to be dis- 
persed by the dragoons, they met to hear the sermons of 
their favourite preachers. But so great was the danger in- 
curred by thus worshipping God according to their consciences 
that sentries were stationed on the hill-tops round to give warn- 
ing of the approach of danger, and the men stacked their 
muskets so that they could seize and use them on a moment's 
notice. Such meetings were called Conventicles, and to hunt 
them down bands of soldiers scoured the country in all 
directions. In the south-west the troops were under the 
command of Sir James Tttrner, and it was his severity that 
drove the people to actual revolt. The immediate cause of 
the outbreak was the rescue of an old man from the clutches 
of a group of soldiers who were ill-using him. In the scuffle 
one of the soldiers was wounded. This affair happened at 
Dairy, in Ayrshire. A large body of peasants soon gathered 



vil] THE PERSECUTION. 147 

to protect their conventicles. They seized Turner at Dum- 
fries , and, when their numbers had increased to nearly three 
thousand, they set out for Edinburgh, expecting the people 
of the Eastern Counties to show their former spirit by rising 
to join them. General Thomas Dalziel i who had made him- 
self a reputation by fighting for the Czar of Russia against 
Turks and Tartars, was sent to bar their way. But they 
avoided and passed him. He had to come back after them 
as far as the Pentland Hills, where they were so well posted 
that the troops could only break and disperse them by re- 
peated attacks. But the feeling of this district had changed 
so much that the peasantry now turned against these wild 
Whigs of the Westland, and treated them nearly as badly as 
the troopers had done. 

39. The Persecution.— This rising did no real good, for 
after the defeat at Pentland in 1666 the tyranny became even 
more cruel than before. The trials which followed were in- 
famous, from the shameful and constant use of torture. The 
instruments used for this purpose were the thumbkin, a screw 
applied to the thumb-joint, and the boot, a cylinder in which 
the leg of the victim was crushed by hammering in wedges. 
Both inflicted the most fearful pain without destroying life. 
Twenty men were hanged in different places. The fines and 
forfeitures inflicted were given as rewards to soldiers and 
lawyers who might get them out of the offenders as they 
best could. At this time certain bonds called law-burrows 
were originated. These were bonds by which all the principal 
men in a district pledged themselves to prevent those beneath 
them in rank from breaking the peace. 

40. The Indulgence.— But these measures only increased 
the disorders they were intended to quiet, and the Govern- 
ment tried a new system of greater toleration. An Indul- 
gence was issued, by which those of the outed ministers who 
could prove that they had lived peaceably and had not held 

L 2 



148 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

conventicles since they had been turned out of their livings, 
were allowed to go back to their parishes, provided no one 
else had been put in their place. Some few took advantage 
of it ; but the greater number would not, and looked on 
their indulged brethren as nearly as bad as the prelatists. 
But this semblance of yielding was more than balanced by 
new exactions. I titer communing — that is, having anything 
to do with any persons who had in any way broken any 
of the many laws against conventicles — was denounced as 
a criminal offence. Lauderdale, who succeeded Middleton 
as Commissioner in 1669, brought an army of Celts down 
on the Lowlands, which they pillaged at pleasure, carrying 
back rich spoils to their native mountains. 

41. Murder of Sharp. — S/iarfi, the Primate, who was looked 
on as the originator of all the persecutions, was bitterly 
hated. He was shot at in Edinburgh while getting into his 
carriage, but was not hurt. Some time after he recognized 
the man who had thus tried to take his life. Mitchell the 
assassin was tried, and being bribed by a promise of pardon, 
freely confessed that he had fired the shot. Instead of receiv- 
ing the promised pardon, Mitchell was sent to prison, tortured, 
and finally put to death in 1678. But the very next year 
Mitchell's attempt was repeated with better success. As 
Sharp was driving with his daughter across Magus Moor, 
near St. Andrews, he fell into the hands of a party of men 
who were lying in wait there for one Carmichael, the Sheriff- 
substitute, a wretch who had made himself specially hated. 
When they heard that the Archbishop's coach was coming 
that way, they looked on it as a special act of Providence 
by which the Lord delivered him into their hands. They 
fired into the coach, but did not hit him. He sheltered 
himself behind his daughter, but they dragged him out, and 
hacked him to death on the heath in a very barbarous way, 
May 3, 1679. It had long been believed that Sharp was in 



Vii.] SANQUHAR DECLARATION. 149 

league with the Devil. To find proof of this they had no 
sooner slain him than they began to search everything he 
had with him. At last they opened his snuff-box, when a 
bee flew out. This they agreed must have been his familiar 
spirit. Every effort was made to track the murderers, among 
whom were Hackston of Rathillet and Balfour of Burlcy, 
but they escaped to the West. 

42. Sanquhar Declaration. — The straitest sect of the 
Covenanters now put forth a protest called the Sanquhar 
Declaration. Their leaders were Donald Cargill and 
Richard Cameron, after whom they were called Cameronians. 
Their openly avowed intention was to free the country from 
the tyranny under which it was groaning. They held that 
Charles had by his perjury forfeited the crown. They excom- 
municated both him and his brother fames, Duke of York, 
who was the Commissioner, and surpassed both Middleton 
and Lauderdale in cruelty. To kill either the King or his 
brother, or both of them, the Sanquhar men declared would 
be perfectly justifiable. They joined themselves together 
by one of the old bonds for mutual defence and support. 
Hacksto?i of Rathillet, who had been present at the death 
of Sharp, was a chief man among them. With him as their 
leader they sought a refuge from the troopers who were 
out after them in Airds Moss, in Ayrshire. There they were 
attacked, and, though they fought bravely, were overcome 
by the soldiers. 

43. Drumclog.— The hill-country between Lanark and Ayr 
was the favourite haunt of the Covenanters. Here they held 
great conventicles, to which the men came armed. One of 
the largest of these meetings was gathered at Dru?nclog, near 
Loudon Hill, when they were attacked by a body of dragoons 
under John Graham, of Claverhouse. But Claverhouse was 
unaccustomed to this irregular way of fighting, and he was 
defeated. The Covenanters, wild with joy, thought that 



150 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

they saw the special hand of Providence in this success. 
They gathered in great numbers, and marched on Glasgow. 
But they did no harm to either the city or the citizens ; they 
only took down from the gates the heads and limbs of their 
friends who had suffered for their faith, and buried them. 

44. Bothwell Bridge. — To put down this revolt, Charles 
sent his illegitimate son, James, Duke of Buccleuch and 
Monmouth, with an army of fifteen thousand men. The 
zeal of the Covenanters was great, but their resources were 
few, and their leaders unskilful. It was therefore an easy 
matter for a well-trained army to defeat them, and at the 
Bridge over the Clyde at Bothwell they were beaten with 
great slaughter. Twelve hundred fell into the hands of the 
victors. Seven of these were put to death, some were re- 
leased on giving sureties for their future good conduct, and 
the rest were shipped off to the plantations. Cameron fell in 
this fray. Hacksto?i and Cargill were taken, and brought to 
trial at Edinburgh, found guilty, and put to death afterwards. 

45. Test Act. — While the Duke of York was Commissioner, 
an Act was passed to the effect that all persons taking office, 
whether under Government or from the Corporation of 
Burghs, should take the Test, an oath for the maintenance 
of the Protestant Faith as it had been established in the first 
Parliament of James the Sixth. At the same time the King 
was declared supreme in Church and State, and the heredi- 
tary succession was declared to be unchangeable. Now, as 
it was well known that James, the King's brother and the 
heir to the throne, was a Romanist, it was clear that the Test 
gave no security to the Protestant Faith, if James, when 
King, could make what changes he pleased in the Church. 

46. Argyle's Opposition. — Archibald, Earl of Argyle, who 
had been restored to his father's earldom, was' the most 
powerful chief in the kingdom. His father had lost his life 
for his attachment to the Covenant, but he himself had 



VII.] THE KILLING TIME. 15 1 

hitherto upheld the Government, and had even offered to 
bring his Highlanders to its support. Now, however, he 
showed signs of opposition, for he would only take the Test 
with the protest that he did so only in so far as it was con- 
sistent with itself and with the safety of the Protestant Faith. 
For this reservation he was accused of leasing-making, that 
is, of making mischief between the King and his people. 
This offence had, by a most unjust law passed in the reign 
of James the Sixth, been made treason. By this law Argyle 
was condemned to death. He escaped and fled to Holland, 
where he became the centre of a party of his fellow-country- 
men who had also left their country because of their political 
opinions. After this unjust attack on Argyle no one could 
be sure of his liberty, and a scheme was got up for emigra- 
tion to Carolina. One Robert Ferguson was connected with 
this scheme. As this man was concerned in an English plot 
against the life of the King, called the Rye House Plot, all 
who had any dealings with him were suspected of being art 
and part in that too, and were called to account before the 
Council. Baillie of Jerviswood, a man much beloved and 
respected, was tried on an accusation of conspiracy, was 
found guilty, and put to death. His death greatly increased 
the popular discontent. 

47. James VII. 1685-1688. The Killing Time.— The 
death of Charles and the accession of James rather made 
matters worse than better for the people. Another defiance 
from the Cameronians, called the Apologetical Declaration, 
was met by an Act which gave the soldiers power at once 
to put to death anyone who would not take the Abjuration 
Oath; that is, swear that they abhorred and renounced this 
treasonable Declaration. A time of cruel slaughter followed, 
in which Claverhouse was the chief persecutor. Many 
heartrending tales are told of the sufferings of the poor 
creatures whose fanaticism led them to persist in refusing to 



152 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

take this oath. There is a story told that one John Brown, 
known as the " Christian Carrier," a man of great repute 
among them, was shot dead by Claverhouse himself, almost 
without warning, before the eyes of his wife. At another time 
two women, Margaret Maclauchlan and Margaret Wilson — • 
one old, the other young — were, it is said, tied to stakes on 
the Solway shore, that they might be drowned by inches by 
the flowing tide. These tales and others of a like sort, 
bear witness to the brutality of the one side and to the 
constancy of the other. Early in James's reign an Act was 
passed by which attending a Conve?iticle became a capital 
crime. 

48. Argyle' s Rising. — Monmouth was in Holland when 
his father died, and many refugees from England and Scot- 
land were there with him. Among them they got up a 
scheme for placing him on the throne in place of his uncle 
James, who was hated, while Monmouth was very popular. 
To carry this out they planned a rising, which was to have 
taken place at the same time in both kingdoms. Argyle was 
to take the lead in Scotland, but he was subject to the inter- 
ference of a Committee chosen from among the others. The 
Government was informed of this intended outbreak, and all 
the clans that were known to be hostile to Argyle were 
roused against him. Early in May he landed in Ki?ity?-e, 
and sent out the fiery cross to summon his clansmen, who 
mustered to the number of 1800. But the quarrels and the 
jealousy of the Committee placed over him overthrew all his 
plans. By their advice he marched into the Lowlands, 
where the people were little disposed to join him. The fort 
where he had stored his arms and ammunition was seized by 
the King's men. His men were starving. They deserted in 
large numbers, and were at last dispersed by a false alarm 
as they were marching on Glasgow. Argyle himself was 
taken while trying to escape. He was still lying under the 



vii.] DEPOSITION OF JAMES. 153 

old sentence of death, which had been passed against him 
for leasing-making. This sentence was executed without 
any further trial, and with a repetition of all the indignities 
which had been heaped upon Montrose. After his deaih the 
vengeance of the Government fell on his clansmen. The 
country round Inverary was wasted, while great numbers of 
the clan were transported to the plantations, many of them 
having been first cruelly mutilated. At the first alarm of 
the invasion a large body of prisoners for religious opinion, 
of all ages and both sexes, had been sent to Dunnottar, a 
strong castle on the coast of Kincardine, where they were so 
closely crowded together in one dungeon that many died there. 
Most of the survivors were also sent to the plantations. 

49. The Indulgence. — Up to this time the Cou?icil had 
blindly followed in the lead of the King. They would now 
do so no longer, as they feared that he meant -to restore the 
Roman Catholic Faith. The Duke ot Queensberry, the Com- 
missioner, was deprived of his office, and James Drummond, 
Earl of Perth, a convert to Romanism, was placed in his 
stead. James next tried to get a Bill passed by which all 
the penalties against the Roman Catholics should be done 
away, while those against the Covenanters should remain 
in force. To this Bill even the bishops objected, and James 
saw that there was nothing for it but to treat all sects alike. 
He published several Indulgences, but it was only the last, in 
1688, that was full and complete. It extended toleration to 
all, even to the Quakers, who had up to this time been as 
much despised and persecuted as the Covenanters. 

50. Deposition of James. — This change of policy on the 
part of the King had come too late. His attack on the 
lib rties of the Church in England had been resisted by 
seven of her bishops ; and before long his English subjects 
resolved to bear his tyranny no longer. They invited his 
nephew and son-in-law, William, Prince of Orange, to come 



154 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

to their aid. He came, and was by common consent invited 
^o mount the throne abdicated by James. When the news 
of William's entry into London reached Edinburgh, a depu- 
tation, headed by Hamilton, was sent to him, to pray him to 
call a Co?ivention of the Estates, and, till it met, to take the 
government of Scotland into his own hands, Jan. 7th, 1689. 

51. William and Mary. 1689-1702. The Convention. — 
When the Convention met there was a large Whig majority. 
They passed a resolution that James by his misgovernment 
had forfeited the throne ; they therefore deposed him, and 
offered the crown to William and his wife Mary, the daughter 
of James, on the same terms as had been made in England. 
The Co7ivention then turned itself into a Pai'liament, which 
went on to the end of the reign. The members went in 
procession to the Cross of Edinburgh, where their vote wa? 
read. William and Mary were then proclaimed ; and the 
ministers of parishes were ordered to pray publicly for the 
King and Queen, on pain of being turned out of their livings. 
To the Clai?n of Right, which was much the same as the 
English one, a special clause was added, declaring prelacy to 
be an intolerable burthen which had long been hateful to the 
people, and which ought to be swept away. Three Commis- 
sioners were sent with the Instrument of Government to 
London. Argyle administered the coronation oath ; but 
William, while taking it, declared that he would not become 
a persecutor in support of any sect. 

52. The Rabbling. — The fall of James was followed by the 
fall of the Episcopal Church, which had made itself hateful 
to the greater number of the people. They took the law into 
their own hands, and on Christmas Day, 1688, a general 

attack was made on the curates or parish priests in the 
Western Lowlands. About two hundred curates with their 
families were at once driven out of their houses with every 
sort of insult and abuse. William did not approve of these 



vii.] DUNDEE'S REVOLT. 155 

excesses, but he had no means of putting a stop to them, for 
there was no regiment north of the Tweed. He put forth a 
proclamation ordering all persons to lay down their arms, but 
it was little heeded. The rabbling and turning out went on 
much as before. If the bishops would have taken the oaths, 
William would most likely have protected them ; but they 
remained true to their old master, and shared his fall. For 
a time all was disorder. In some parishes the curates went 
on ministering as heretofore, while in others the Presbyterian 
divines held services in tents, or illegally occupied the pulpits. 
It was not till June 1690 that the Presbyterian Church 
was re-established by law. Sixty of the ministers who had 
been turned out at the Restoration were still living, and to 
them was given authority to visit all the parishes, and to 
turn out all those curates whom they thought wanting in 
abilities, scandalous in morals, or unsound in faith. Those 
livings from which the curates had been rabbled and driven 
away were declared vacant. This way of dealing with the 
Church gave offence both to the Episcopalians and to the ex- 
treme Presbyterians, who did not approve of the interference 
of the King in Church matters. Both these parties continued 
to look on William and Mary as usurpers. 

53. Dundee's Revolt. — When the Convention first met, 
each party, Whigs and Jacobites alike, had dreaded an out- 
break on the part of the other. In the cellars of the city 
were hidden large numbers of Cove7ianters, who had been 
brought up from the West to overawe the Jacobites, while the 
Duke of Gordon held the Castle for James, and he could, if he 
had so chosen, have turned the guns upon the city. But the 
Jacobites, finding themselves in the minority, determined to 
leave Edinburgh, and to hold a rival Convention at Stirling; 
while it was agreed that the Marquess of A thole should 
bring a body of his Highlanders to protect them. But this 
plan was so ill concerted that Claverhouse, now Viscount 



156 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

Dundee, left hastily before the others were ready, an alarm 
was given, and they were all secured. Dundee withdrew to 
his own house in the Highlands, and stayed there quietly for 
some time. But a few months later certain letters written to 
him by James fell into the hands of the Government, and an 
order was sent out for his arrest. Thus roused to action, he 
summoned the clans for King James. Many of them joined 
him, more from hatred of Argyle than from love for James. 
General Mackay, who had come North with three regiments, 
was sent against him ; but he was not used to the Highland 
way of fighting, and wasted some weeks in running about 
after an enemy who always kept out of his way. Dundee had 
no regular troops, but, as Montrose had done before him, he 
showed what good soldiers the Celts can make with a good 
leader. As both Dundee and Montrose- were Lowlanders, 
they could not excite the jealousy of the chiefs, and were all 
the better fitted for the supreme command of a Celtic army. 
Each clan in such an army formed a regiment bound together 
by a tie of common brotherhood, and all bound to live or die 
for the colonel their chief; and so long as the clans could be 
kept from quarrelling all went well. Dundee wrote to James, 
who was now in Ireland, for help ; but he only sent three 
hundred miserably-equipped foot, under an officer named 
Canon. The hopes of the Whigs were placed in Argyle and 
the western Covenanters, but neither of these did all that was 
expected of them. Argyle could not, because his country 
had been so lately wasted ; and the Covenanters would not, 
because the more part of them thought it a sin to fight for 
a King who had not signed the Covenant. Some of them 
however thought otherwise, and of these a regiment was 
raised, and placed under the command of the Earl of Angus. 
This regiment was called the Cameronians. 

54. Battle of Killiecrankie. — The war now broke out 
again. It wa; the great aim of each party to win over the 



vil] BATTLE OF KILLIECRANKIE. 157 

adherents of Athole. The Marquess himself, to keep out of 
harm's way, had gone to England, and of those whom he had 
left to act for him some were for James, others for the King 
and Queen. It was of importance to both sides to secure 
the castle of Blair, which belonged to Athole, and near there 
the two armies met, at Killiecrankie, a pass leading into the 
Highlands. Here the Celts won a brilliant and decided 
victory. The clansmen charged sword in hand down the 
pass with such fury that they swept their foes before them ; 
and Mackay, with a few hundred men, all he could gather 
of his scattered army, was forced to flee to Stirling, July 
27, 1689. But this success had been dearly bought by the 
death of Dundee. Thus left without a leader, the victors 
thought more of plunder than pursuit ; nor was there 
anyone among them fitted to fill Dundee's place, and to 
follow up the advantage he had won. Recruits came in, 
their numbers increased, but this only made the disorder 
greater. 

55. Attack on Dunkeld. Buchan's Attempt. — A month 
later they attacked the Cameronian regiment stationed at 
Dunkeld. They took the town at the first attack, but the 
soldiers defended themselves in the church and in a house 
belonging to Athole in the town with such spirit, that the 
Highlanders were driven back. They blamed the Irish for 
the defeat, and the Irish blamed them, and the end of it was 
that the clans dispersed, and Canon and his Irish withdrew 
to Mull. In the spring of the next year the clans gathered 
again, under an officer named Buchan, who came from 
James with a commission to act as his commander-in-chief 
in Scotland. But they were surprised and scattered in the 
strath of the Spey, by Sir William Livingstone, who held 
Inverness for William. This action ended the Civil War in 
Scotland, for Gordon had long since given up Edinburgh 
Castle. To keep the western clans in order, Mackay built 



158 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

a fort in the west of Inveritesshire, which was called Fort 
William, in honour of the King. The castle on the Bass, a 
rock in the Firth of Forth, was the last place which held 
out for James, but the garrison were at last obliged to 
give in, from want of food. 

56. Reduction of the Highlands. — Still the chiefs did not 
take the oaths to William, and were clearly only waiting for 
the appearance of a new leader to break out again. To win 
them over to the Government a large sum of money was put 
into the hands of John Campbell, Earl of Breadalbane. He 
was accused of cheating both the clans and the King by 
keeping a part of this sum himself, and he never gave any 
clear account of what he had done with it. At the same 
time a proclamation was put forth which offered pardon to 
all the rebels who should take the oaths to William and 
Mary before or on December 31, 169 1. All who did not take 
advantage of this offer were after that day to be dealt with 
as enemies and traitors, and warlike preparations were made 
for carrying out the threat. 

57. Massacre of Glencoe. — By the day named the clans had 
all come in, except Maclan, chief of a tribe of MacDonalds, 
who lived in Glencoe, a wild mountain valley in the north- 
western corner of Argyleshire. On the last day, December 
31, Maclan and his principal clansmen went to Fort 
William to take the oaths, but found that there was no one 
there who had authority to administer them. There was no 
magistrate nearer than Inverary, and, as the ground was 
deeply covered with snow, it was some days before Maclan 
got there. But the sheriff, in consideration of his goodwill 
and of the delay that he had met with, administered the 
oaths, (January 6,) and sent an account of the whole affair to 
the Privy Council at Edinburgh. Unfortunately for Glencoe, 
Breadalbane was his bitter personal enemy, and along with 
Sir John Dairy mfile, the Master of Stair, he determined on 



VII.] MASSACRE OF GLENCOE. 159 

his destruction. An order for the extirpation of the whole 
iriue was drawn up and presented to William, who signed 
it, and it was carried out with cold-blooded treachery. A 
party of soldiers, under the command of Campbell of Glen- 
lyon, appeared in the Glen. They gave out that they came as 
friends, and as such they were kindly welcomed, and shared 
the hospitality of the MacDonalds for a fortnight. Without 
any warning they turned on their hosts, and before dawn of 
a winter's morning slew nearly all the dwellers in the valley, 
old and young together, February 13, 1691. They then 
burnt the houses, and drove off the cattle, so that nothing 
was left for the few wretched beings who had escaped 
death but to perish miserably of cold and hunger. Whether 
William knew the whole state of the case or not when he 
signed the warrant is not certain, but he did not punish 
those who had dared to commit this wholesale murder in 
his name. And though four years after, when a stir was 
made about it, he did grant a commission to the Privy 
Council to inquire into the matter, he did not bring to judg- 
ment the Master of Stair, who was very clearly pointed out 
as the guilty person. 

58. Darien Scheme. — Just at this time the public attention 
was taken up with a scheme for founding a new colony on 
the Isthmus of Darien, and people's minds were so full of it 
that nothing else was thought of. It was got up by William 
Paterson, who is to be remembered as the originator of the 
Bank of England. He fancied that he had found, what 
Columbus and the other navigators of his day had sought 
in vain, a short cut to the Indies. His plan was to plant a 
colony on the isthmus which unites North and South America, 
and to make it the route by which the merchandise of the 
East should be brought to Europe, thereby shortening the 
long sea- voyage. He drew glowing pictures of the untold 
wealth that would thus fall to the lot of those who were 



160 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap 

clear-sighted enough to join in the venture. A charter was 
granted to the new Company, which gave them a monopoly 
of the trade with Asia, Africa, and America for a term of 
thirty-one years, with leave to import all goods duty free, ex- 
cept foreign sugar and tobacco. Never had project been so 
popular. Every one was anxious to take shares. Half the 
capital of Scotland was invested in it, and poor and rich alike, 
deceived by Patersoii's lying stories of the healthiness and 
fertility of the soil and climate, were eager to hasten to the 
new colony. A few vessels were bought at Hamburg and 
Amsterdam. In these twelve hundred emigrants set sail on 
the 25th July, 1698, and arrived safely on the shore of the 
Gulf of Darien. They named the settlement which they 
founded there New Caledonia, and built a town and a fort, 
to which they gave the names of New Edinburgh and St. 
Andrews. But, to set up such a trading market with any 
hopes of success, they ought to have had the good will and 
help of the great trading countries of Europe. Instead of 
this, England and Holland were much opposed to the scheme, 
as being an interference with their trading rights. The East 
India Company looked on the bringing in of Eastern merchan- 
dise to Scotland as an infringement of their privileges. Spain 
too claimed the Isthmus as her own, and seized one of the 
Sco tish ships ; while the Governor of the English colonies in 
North America refused to let them have supplies. In addition 
to these difficulties from without, the climate was wretchedly 
unhealthy. Disease quickly thinned their ranks, till at last 
the miserable remnant whom it spared were glad to flee from 
almost certain death. They deserted the new settlement, and 
set sail for New York. Meanwhile such glowing reports of 
the success of the venture had been spread abroad at home, 
that a second body of thirteen hundred emigrants, ignorant 
of the fate of those who had gone before them, set sail in 
August oV the next year. They found the colony deserted, 



VII.] ANNE. 161 

and the colonists gone. They themselves fared no better 
than the first settlers, and were in a few months driven out 
by the Spaniards. The Scottish people were deeply mortified 
and much enraged by the failure of this scheme. They 
blamed William for all the disasters of the colonists, because 
he had done nothing to help them, nor to prevent the 
interference of Spain. The Charter had been granted by 
the Government of Scotland without the King's knowledge 
when he was in Holland ; and though he could not recall it, 
it would have been unjust to his English subjects to show any 
favour to a scheme which, had it succeeded, might have 
proved the ruin of their East Indian trade. So much bad 
feeling arose out of this unfortunate affair between the two 
nations, that it was plain that if there was not a closer union 
between them there would be a breach before long. 

59. William's Death. — Just as the project of an Union was 
about to be considered in the English Parliament, William 
died, March 8, 1702. Since the death of Mary, in 1690, he 
had reigned alone. Both crowns now passed to Anne, the 
younger daughter of James VII. 

60. Education Act. — It was in this reign that the system 
of national education which has made the Scotch, as a 
people, so intelligent and well-informed, was re-cast. An 
Act was passed, in 1696, by which every parish was required 
to provide a suitable schoolhouse, and to pay a properly 
qualified schoolmaster for the instruction of the children 
of the parish. 

61. Anne, 1702-1714. Act of Security. — James VII. had 
died in France a few months before his nephew, and his son 
had been proclaimed there as James VIII. This made the 
Whigs anxious to have an Act passed in Scotland similar to 
the English Act of Settlement. By this Act the Parliament 
of England had settled that, if Anne died without heirs, 
the crown should pass to the nearest Protestant heir, Sophia, 

M M 



162 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

Electress of Hanover, grand-daughter of James the Sixth, 
or to her descendants. But the Estates still felt injured 
and angry about the late differences with England, and 
passed an Act of Security, which made express conditions 
that the same person should not succeed to the throne of 
both kingdoms, unless, during Queen Anne's reign, measures 
had been taken for securing the honour and independence 
of the Scottish nation against English influence. The right 
of declaring war against England at any time was to remain 
with the Scottish Parliament. 

62. Trial and Death of Captain Green. — Just at this time 
an event happened which tended to increase the bad feeling 
between the two countries. An English ship, the Worcester, 
was driven by stress of weather into the Firth of Forth. It 
was seized by the Scots, because the East India Company 
had some time before detained a Scotch ship. From the talk 
of some of the crew it was suspected that they had murdered 
the captain and crew of one of the Darien vessels which was 
missing. On this charge Captain Gree?i of the Worcester, 
his mate and crew, were brought to trial before the High 
Court of Admiralty. On the evidence of a black slave they 
were found guilty and condemned, and Green, his mate, and 
one of the crew were hanged. It was afterwards found out 
that the crime for which they had suffered had never been 
committed. The missing ship had gone ashore on the island 
of Madagascar, where Drutntnond, the captain, was then 
living. Whatever wrongs the Scots had suffered, the Eng- 
lish had now, after this unlawful deed, a very reasonable 
cause of complaint against them. 

63. The Union. — It was clear that, if the two kingdoms 
were to go on together in peace, it could only be by joining 
their Parliaments and their commercial interests into 
one. Commissioners from both sides were appointed to 
consider the best way of effecting this union. Godolphin % 



vii.] RESULTS OF THE UNION. 163 

the T?-easurer of England, and the Duke of Queensberry, 
the Royal Commissioner in Scotland, were its chief pro- 
moters. The Commissioners drew up a Treaty of Union, 
which was approved by the Parliaments of both countries. 
By the Articles of Union the succession to both crowns 
was settled in the Protestant heirs of Sophia; and each 
country was secured in the possession of her national 
Church as then established. Scotland was to send six- 
teen Representative Peers, elected from the whole body 
of Peers, and forty-five members from the Commons, to the 
Parliament at Westminster, henceforth to be called the 
Parliament of Great Britain. It was further settled that 
one seal, with the arms of both kingdoms quartered upon it, 
should serve for both countries, that both should be subject 
to the same Excise duties and Customs, and should have 
the same privileges of trade. The same coins, weights, and 
measures were to be used throughout the island. The law- 
courts of Scotland, the Court of Justiciary and the Court 
of Session, were to remain unchanged, only there was now a 
right of appeal from the Court of Session, which had hitherto 
been supreme in all civil cases, to the House of Lords. In 
addition to the twenty-five Articles of Union, a special Act 
was passed for securing the liberty of the Church of Scot- 
land as it then stood in all time coming, and declaring that 
the Presbyterian should be the only Church government 
in Scotland. The first Parliament of Great Britain met 
October 23, 1707. 

64. Results of the Union. — Twice before this time the 
Legislature of the two kingdoms had been thus joined to- 
gether into one, under Edward I. and under Cromwell. But 
these two unions, each the result of conquest, had lasted but 
a little while. This Union was destined to be more enduring, 
and to lead to increased prosperity in both kingdoms. For 
Scotland it was the beginning of quite a new state of things. 

M 2 



1 64 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chak 

Hitherto the struggle for national life had left her no leisure 
for internal development, and at the time of the Union she 
was without manufactures, shipping, or commerce. With the 
end of her independent nationality a new social life began, and 
a spirit of industry and enterprise was awakened, which has 
since raised her people to their present eminence in trade, 
manufactures, and agriculture. The Union struck the last 
blow at the power of the Scottish nobles. They were not 
placed by any means on the same level with the Peers of 
the sister kingdom. It brought to the Commons, who during 
this period had been much despised and oppressed, an in- 
crease in dignity and independence, by admitting them to a 
share in the liberty and privileges which the Commons of 
England had won for themselves with the sword. But what 
did even more for the prosperity of Scotland was the removal 
of all restrictions on her trade, which was now placed on 
the same footing as that of the larger kingdom. For half a 
century after the union of the crowns she had enjoyed 
free trade with England and her colonies ; but that was 
brought to an end by the Navigation Act, passed soon after 
the Restoration, which forbade the importing of any foreign 
goods into England except in English vessels, and which 
was, as the Scots justly complained, the ruin of their rising 
commerce. 

65. Literature and Art. — Between the union of the Crowns 
and the union of the Parliaments there was but little advance 
in literature or art. This was in great part owing to the fact 
that, just when all other nations had taken to writing in their 
own tongues in place of Latifi, the Scottish Court migrated 
to London. There the Northumbrian English, which was the 
common speech of the Lowlands of Scotland, was despised 
as a provincial dialect, in which no educated man would 
write if he wished his writings to be read. During this 
period, the talent that was to be found in the country was 



vii.] LITERATURE AND ART 165 

enlisted in the religious struggle, which occupied all men's 
minds, and it produced many divines eminent for eloquence 
and learning. The literature of the times was, like the 
fighting, the tyranny, and the persecutions, chiefly of a reli- 
gious character. There were many men of learning and 
talent, renowned either for their writings or from their elo- 
quence, to be found among the leaders of the different sects. 
Among the Presbyterians the most eminent were John 
Welch, the son-in-law of Knoxj Alexander Henderson; 
Guthrie, the martyr of the Remonstrants, and George Gil- 
lespie, who, from his gift for argument, was called the " Ham 
mer of the Malignants" The Episcopal Church could boast 
of some scholarly divines, such as John and Patrick 
Forbes, and Leight07i, Archbishop of Glasgow. Of poets 
there were but few ; none who could bear comparison with 
those of an earlier time. Drummond of Hawthornden is 
chief among them, but his genius is obscured by an imi- 
tation of the dialect and style then prevalent in England. 
Many of the beautiful ballads and songs of which Scotland 
may justly be proud, must have been composed about this 
time, but the authors are unknown. Unknown also, or for- 
gotten, are the musicians to whom Scotland owes the wild, 
sweet strains to which those songs were sung, those pathetic 
melodies which make the national music so peculiar and 
characteristic in its exquisite beauty. The oldest collection 
of these airs is in a manuscript which seems to date from 
the sixteenth century. To George Jameson, the earliest 
Scottish painter of note, we owe the life-like portraits of the 
heroes of these times. He was. born at Aberdeen and in 
1620 he settled in his native town as a portrait-paintei. But 
the spirit of the Covenant was opposed to art. Though it 
inspired to heroic deeds, there were no songs made about 
them. Architecture fared even worse than poetry, for while 
churches, the work of former ages, were pulled down, any 



1 66 THE UNION OF THE CROWNS. [chap. 

new ones that were put up were as ugly and tasteless as it 
was possible to make them. Napier of Merchiston, a zealous 
reformer, the writer of an Expla7iatio7i of the Apocalypse, is 
known in the world of science as the inventor of Logarithms, 
a clever and easy way of shortening difficult numerical cal- 
culations. 

66. Summary. — The union of the crowns of England and 
Scotland put a stop to the constant skirmishing on the 
Border and to the devastating inroads which had for cen- 
turies embittered the two countries against one another. It 
might therefore have been expected that Scotland, during 
the century which passed between the union of the Crowns 
and the union of the Parliaments, would have made great 
social advances. This was prevented by the ceaseless party 
strife which disgraced the century, and made this period one 
of the most disastrous and oppressive to the people in the 
whole history of the nation. James the Sixth had found the 
strict discipline and constant interference of the ministers so 
irksome, and the turbulent independence of his nobles so 
little to his mind, that he was delighted to escape from both 
to the richer kingdom to which his good fortune called him. 
The severe training of his childhood had made him hate the 
Presbyterian polity with all his heart. As soon as he had 
the power, he changed the government of the Church, and 
introduced various observances which were hateful to the 
people. His son Charles went a step further, and by his at- 
tempt to substitute an English for a Scottish Liturgy, drove 
the people to revolt. The war thus begun, by an effort to 
force on the hereditary kingdom of his - race the customs of 
the larger kingdom which his father had acquired, ended in 
his losing both. Scotland enjoyed a short gleam of pros- 
perity from the conquest of Cromwell till his death. Under 
the next Stewart, Charles the Second, the King to whom she 
had always been loyal, the government was entrusted to a 



viii.] DISCONTENT WITH THE UNION. 167 

council, which exercised a cold-blooded tyranny against which 
the people had no redress. This reign of terror only rooted 
their religious prejudices the more firmly in their minds. 
When the tyrant James was deposed, the reaction of popular 
feeling fell heavily on the clergy of the Established Church, 
who individually were no way accountable for the crimes 
which had been committed under the mask of zeal for Epi- 
scopacy. Under William the Presbyterian polity was re- 
established, and the Episcopal clergy had in their turn to 
suffer many hardships from severe laws and the intolerance 
of party feeling, though nothing to compare with the bloody 
persecution under the form of law which had disgraced the 
reigns of Charles and James. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

AFTER THE UNION. 

Discontent with the Union (1)— change of dynasty (2) — Jacobite 
rising (3) — measures of the Government (4) — rising in the North m 
of England (5) — battle of Sheriffmuir (6) — arrival of James (7) 
— trials and penalties (8) — malt-tax riots (9) — Porteous riots (10) 
— the Forty -five {11)— taking of Edinburgh (12) — battle of 
Freston-pans{\^) — battle of Falkirk (14) — battle of Cullodtn (15) 
— Charles's wanderings (16) — penalties after the Forty-five (17) — 
abolition of slavery (18) — attacks on the Romanists (19) — trials for 
sedition (20) — Reform Bill (21) — religious sects (22)— the Dis- 
ruption (23) — social m pr-ogress (24) — literature and art (25) — sum' 
?nary (26). 

I. Discontent with the Union. — Though the Union was 
such a good thing for Scotland, the people were a long time 
in finding this out. The old national jealousy was roused; 



168 AFTER THE UNION. [chap. 

they thought that their dearly loved independence was being 
sacrificed. There were riots in different places ; and though 
the people were quieted by the assurance that the insignia of 
loyalty, the regalia or crown jewels, should not be carried 
out of the kingdom, for long afterwards the Union was very 
unpopular, and had to bear the blame of everything that 
went wrong. There was still too a large party, chiefly in 
the Highlands, attached to James Stewart, known as the 
Chevalier de St. George or the Old P?'etender, as the Whigs 
called him. Jacobitism, which was in England a mere empty 
word used to express any sort of discontent with the existing 
state of things, meant something more in Scotland. There 
it was the traditionary feeling of loyalty and love towards 
the ancient line of kings ; and for James, their representative, 
there were many who were ready to venture their lands, or 
their life if need were. As long as Anne lived there was no 
excuse for an outbreak, for she too was a Stewart, and it was 
hoped that her brother might succeed her. 

2. Change of Dynasty. — When Amie died, the son of 
Sophia, George, Elector of Ha?wver, succeeded without 
opposition, according to the Act of Settle?7ietit. Before 
long, he and his Germaii favourites became very unpopular. 
This gave the Jacobites hopes that, if they raised the 
standard for James, all the discontented in both kingdoms 
would join them in an attempt to restore him to the throne of 
his fathers. 

3. Jacobite Rising. — To give to such an attempt the least 
chance of success, three conditions were necessary. Firstly, 
that the rising should take place at the same time in both 
kingdoms ; secondly, that it should be helped by France; and 
thirdly, that the prince for whom it was made should come 
among his people, and lead them in person. All three were 
wanting in this unfortunate rebellion. James made no per- 
sonal effort to get the crown on the death of his sister, 



Viii.] JACOBITE RISING. 169 

though six weeks passed before George came over from 
Hanover. During this interval James issued a manifesto 
from Plombieres, August 29, 17 14. In this manifesto he as- 
serted his right to the crown, and explained that he had 
remained quiet while his sister lived, because he had no doubt 
of her good intentions towards him. A year, however, was 
allowed to pass before any active steps were taken. Just when 
the plans for the rising were all made, Louis XIV. of France, 
who was the best friend the Chevalier had, died, and was 
succeeded by the next heir, his great-grandson, an infant. 
The Duke of Orleans, who became Regent, was disposed to 
be friendly to the Government of England ; indeed his regency 
was one of the few times when there was any real friendliness 
between the two countries. By his order some ships lying 
at Havre, which had been fitted out for James, were un- 
loaded, and the arms stored in the royal magazines. These 
ships were intended for the succour of the rebels in Scotland, 
where the standard was raised for James by John Erskine, 
Earl of Mar, at the junction of the Clung and the Dee, Sep- 
tember 6, 17 15. Mar had begun life as a Whig, but had 
changed sides so often that he was nicknamed " Bobbing 
John." He had addressed a loyal letter to King George 
on his accession, but as, by the change of ministry, he lost his 
office of Secretary of State for Scotland and saw no hope of 
getting it back again, he became an ardent Jacobite, and the 
leader of the party in Scotland. The very day before he set 
off to raise the Highlands for James he attended a Wee of 
the King. Before his coming north he sent letters to the 
principal Jacobites, inviting them to a hunting-match. This 
meeting was attended by the Marquesses of H2int'y and 
Tullibardine, the eldest sons of the Dukes of Gordon and 
Athole, by the Earl of Southesk, by Glengariy, the chief of 
the MacDoualds, and many others. They all swore to be 
true to one another, and to Mar, as James's general, and then 



i 7 o AFTER THE UNION. [chap. 

returned to their several districts to raise their followers. 
Only sixty men gathered at the raising of the standard, but 
before the end of the month the northern clans had risen. 
James was proclaimed at Aberdeen, Brechin, and Dundee, 
and nearly all the country north of the Tay was soon in 
the hands of the rebels. They laid a plan for seizing Edin- 
burgh Castle, but this was found out and defeated. 

4. Measures of the Government. — There were at this time 
not more than between eight and nine thousand troops in the 
whole island. Of these not more than fifteen hundred were 
in Scotland ; and no more were sent there, for an expected 
rising in the south-western counties of England was then 
thought much more dangerous than the rising in the North. 
In Scotland the chief command was given to the Duke of 
Argyle, whose family were deadly enemies of the Stewarts, 
and whose almost princely power over a" large tract of country 
made him the most likely person to counteract their influence. 
The Earl of Sutherland, who was also a friend of the Go- 
vernment, was sent to raise his followers in the North. The 
Habeas Co?'pus Act was suspended by Act of Parliament, a 
reward of 100,000/. was offered for seizing the Pretender, 
dead or alive, and the King was empowered to seize all sus- 
pected persons. A great number of suspected persons were 
summoned to Edinburgh to give security for their good con- 
duct, but none of them came ; indeed some were by this 
summons induced to take arms for James. Several noted 
Jacobites were put in ward in Edinburgh Castle. 

5. Rising in the North of England. — The active measures 
taken by the Government had put down the intended rising in 
the West of England, but in the North they had only hurried 
it on. An order was sent down for the arrest of Mr. Forster, 
member for Northumberland, and James Radcliffe, Earl oj 
Derwentwater. On hearing this, Forster and Derwent- 
water took up arms at once, and soon mustered three hundred 



viil] BATTLE OF SHE RIFFMUIR. 171 



horse. About the same time Lord Kenmure proclaimed 
James at Moffat, and was joined by the Earls of Nithsdale, 
Wintoun, and Camwath, and several other persons of note. 
He joined his force, about two hundred horsemen, with that 
of Forster, and they marched to Kelso, to wait there for 
the arrival of Brigadier Macintosh, who was marching 
southward with a detachment of about fourteen hundred men, 
from Mar's army, which he brought over the Firth of Forth 
in safety, in the face of three English men-of-war. The com- 
bined force, about two thousand strong, marched along the 
Border. After much debate and hesitation, their leaders at 
last decided to enter Lancashire, where they expected the 
Roman Catholic gentry to rise and join them. The posse 
comitatus, or general muster, which had been raised by the 
Bishop of Carlisle and Lord Lonsdale, fled before them at 
Penrith, leaving a number of horses in their hands. After 
this success the rebels marched on, proclaiming James as 
they went, and levying money. On the 9th November they 
reached Preston, where they were joined by an ill-armed, un- 
disciplined rabble of recruits. But on the appearance of the 
King's troops Forster made no effort to defend the town. He 
was seized with a panic, and surrendered with his followers, 
to the number of fourteen hundred, November 12. 

6. Battle of Sheriffmuir. — Meanwhile Mar was managing 
the affairs of James almost as badly in Scotland. He entered 
Perth September 28 with a force of 5,000. On the 2nd of 
October a detachment of eighty horse captured a vessel with 
300 stand of arms, which were intended for the Earl of 
Sutherland in the North. The vessel had been driven by 
stress of weather to seek shelter at Burntisland, on the coast 
of Fife. Instead of pushing on while his followers were 
inspirited by this success, Mar stayed at Perth doing nothing. 
The Duke of Argyle, who was sent to oppose him, ar- 
rived in Scotland and marched to Stirling in the middle of 



172 AFTER THE UNION. [chap. 

September. He had then only 1500 men at his command, 
but before Mar made any attempt to engage him his army 
had been more than doubled by reinforcements from Ire- 
land. It was not till November 10 that Mar left Perth. He 
marched south as far as Ardoch. Argyle brought his troops 
forward to Dunblane. On Sunday the 13th, the two armies 
advanced to meet each other, and a battle was fought at 
SJicriffmuir, a moor on the slope of a spur of the Ochils. 
The result was doubtful. Each army defeated and put to 
flight the left wing of the other and then drew off the field, 
the rebels to Ardoch, Argyle to Dimblane, and both lost 
about the same number of men. Each side claimed the 
victory, but Argyle took possession of the field the next day. 
After the battle Argyle went back to Stirling and Mar to 
Perth. There the clans began to desert him, going home as 
usual with their plunder, while Argyle's force was increased 
by six thousand Dutch troops. 

7. Arrival of James. — James at last made his appearance, 
but not till his followers had been taken prisoners in the one 
country and had lost their spirit in the other. He landed at 
Peterhead, December 22, attended by only six persons. He 
was met by Mar, and went on to Scone, whence he issued six 
proclamations, and fixed his coronation for January 23. The 
news of his landing had somewhat revived the spirit of his 
followers, but, when they met, both parties were disappointed; 
James with their scanty numbers, and they with his heavi- 
ness and stupidity. Soon after, a vessel coming from France 
with gold for the rebels was stranded and the money lost. 
At last Argyle began to advance against James, who re- 
treated from Perth, greatly to the disgust of the clans. From 
Perth they went to P>undee,\nd from thence to Montrose. 
Twelve hours after they had left Perth Argyle entered it, but 
he was so slack in his pursuit of the rebels as to give rise to 
suspicions of his own loyalty. A few days later, February 4, 



viii.] TRIALS AND PENALTIES. 173 

James set sail secretly for France with. Mar and several other 
nobles. He left a letter for Argyle, and all the money he had 
with him for the benefit of the poor people in the villages 
round Perth, which had been lurnt by his order. His men, 
grieved and disappointed to find that their leader had deserted 
them, went back to their native glens. Most of the officers 
escaped to the Orkneys, and from thence to the Continent. 

8. Trials and Penalties. — Few prisoners had been made 
in Scotland. Of those taken at Preston, the half-pay officers 
were at once shot as deserters, the common soldiers were 
imprisoned in Chester and Liverpool, while their leaders were 
taken up to London, which they entered with their hands tied 
behind them and their horses led. Six nobles, the Earls of 
Nithsdale, Wintoun, and Camwath, Viscount Kenmure, and 
the Lords Widdringion and Nairn, were arraigned before 
the House of Lords on a charge of treason. All except 
Wintoun pleaded guilty, and threw themselves on the King's 
grace ; but they were all condemned to death. This sentence 
was executed on Derwentwater only. Kemnure and Nairn 
and Camwath were reprieved, while Nithsdale escaped by 
the help of his wife the night before the day on which he was 
condemned to die ; and Wintoun, though found guilty on 
his trial, escaped also. Forster, Macintosh, and several 
others, had the same good fortune. Of those lower in rank, 
twenty-two were hanged in Lancashire and four in London. 
An Act of Grace, passed in 1717, released Camwath, Wid- 
drington, Nairn, and all others who were still in prison ; but 
it did not restore the estates which they had forfeited by their 
treason. The following year another Jacobite conspiracy 
was got up. In this both Spain and Sweden were con- 
cerned ; Spain promised to help with money, while Charles 
the Twelfth of Sweden was to invade Scotland with twelve 
thousand soldiers. It was discovered, and prevented by the 
arrest of the persons suspected of sharing in it. 



174 AFTER THE UNION. [chap 



9. Malt-tax Riots. — In 17 13 it was proposed to extend 
the malt-tax which was paid in England, to Scotland. But 
this measure met with such strong opposition on the part 
of the Scotch members as almost to threaten a dissolution of 
the Union. At length, in 1724, a duty of threepence on every 
barrel of ale was laid on instead of the malt-tax. But though 
this time the members agreed to the new tax, the people 
would not, and a serious riot broke out at Glasgow. Two 
companies of foot were sent from Edinburgh to put down the 
tumult, under the command of Captain Bushell, who ordered 
his men to fire, whereby nine persons were killed and many 
more wounded. This only made the rioters more furious. 
Bushell narrowly escaped being torn in pieces by the mob, 
and had to seek refuge in Dunbarton Castle. The tumult was 
not put down till General Wade brought up a force large 
enough to overawe the mob, and sent the magistrates pri- 
soners to Edinburgh. There they were tried and acquitted. 
To avoid paying the tax, the brewers of Edinburgh made a 
compact to brew no more beer if the duty were not taken 
off. In consequence of these disorders the office of Secre- 
tary of State for Scotland was done away with, because the 
Duke of Roxburgh, who held it, was suspected of encouraging 
the discontent. At length the Earl of /slay was sent down 
to Edinburgh, and succeeded in restoring quietness. Bushell 
was tried for murder and found guilty, but was afterwards 
pardoned and promoted. 

10. Porteous Riots : 1736. — Twelve years later the peace 
was again broken by a tumult at Edinburgh. One IVilson, 
a smuggler, lying under sentence of death for having taken 
part in a fray in which a Custom-house officer was killed, 
had won the sympathy of the people by the clever way in 
which he had managed the escape of a fellow-prisoner. 
When he was hanged at the Grass Market, the mob pelted 
the guard with stones. On this Porteous, Captain of the 



Vin.] PORTEOUS RIOTS. 175 

City Guard, ordered his men to fire, and several innocent 
persons in the crowd were killed and wounded. Porteous 
was tried, and condemned to death as a murderer, but a 
reprieve was sent down from London. Then the people, 
remembering the case of Bushell, determined to take the 
law into their own hands. On the evening before the day 
which had been fixed for the execution of the sentence, while 
Porteous was feasting with his friends to celebrate his escape 
from danger, they gathered in great numbers. To ensure 
against surprise they disarmed the city guard, took their 
weapons, and themselves guarded the gates, so as to 
prevent any tidings being carried to the regiment quartered 
in the suburbs. They then marched to the Tolbooth, for- 
merly the Parliament-house, but now used as a prison. The 
door was so strong that it defied all their efforts to burst it 
open. They set fire to it, upon which the jailer .threw out 
the keys. Leaving the doors open to let the other prisoners 
escape, they then went straight to Porteous' cell, dragged him 
out of the chimney where he was hiding, and carried him to 
the Grass Market, the place of public execution. There they 
hanged him to a dyer's pole, with a rope which they had 
taken from a dealer's stall on the way, and in payment for 
which they had left a guinea. They then dispersed, without 
noise or further violence. The ringleaders were never dis- 
covered, though all ministers of parishes were required to 
read from their pulpits once a month for a year a proclama- 
tion calling on their congregations to give them up. The 
Government brought in a Bill for disgracing the city by the 
loss of the charter and the razing of the gates. But this 
measure was not carried, and the only penalties inflicted 
were that Wilson, the Provost, was declared incapable of 
holding office in future, and that the city was fined 2,000/. 
for the benefit of Porteous' widow. 

11. The "Forty-five." — In 1719 there was a small at- 



176 AFTER THE UNION. [chap. 

tempt made to get up another Jacobite rising. This attempt 
was favoured by Spain, which, just at this time, under the 
guidance of Cardinal Alberoni, minister of Philip the Fifth, 
once more began to take an active part in European affairs. 
England had joined the Quadruple Alliance against Spain, 
which was therefore ready to help in an attempt to overthrow 
the English Government. The Marquess of Tullibardine 
landed on the Lewis with a body of three hundred Spanish 
soldiers. But the stores and arms which were to have been 
sent to him were lost on the way, and, though about two 
thousand Highlanders mustered, they were defeated at Glen- 
shiels by the regular troops. The Highlanders fled to the 
hills, while the Spaniards surrendered, and thus the attempt 
came to nothing. But the clans were still unsubdued, and 
were ready to break out again at any time. General Wade, 
who had been commander-in-chief since the 17 15, made 
excellent roads in many places where there had been none 
before, and an Act was passed for disarming the High- 
landers. But this did more harm than good. The clans 
that were faithful to the Government gave up their arms ; 
but this only made them unable to resist the rebels, who 
kept theirs hidden and ready for use when occasion should 
come. England was now engaged in a continental war ; 
most of the troops were out of the kingdom, and the time 
seemed favourable for another effort. France too promised 
help. Early in 1744 an army of 1,500 men under the com- 
mand of Marshal Saxe, one of the most skilful generals in 
the French service, was collected at Dunkirk, and embarked 
in French transports for the invasion of England. But the 
fleet was dispersed by a storm, and the French were 
unwilling to give any further help. The next year Charles 
Edward, son of the Old Pretender, called the Young 
Chevalier, who was to have led this expedition, deter- 
mined to make a venture on his own account. Without 



Viii.] THE TAKING OF EDINBURGH. 



77 



money, without arms, with only seven followers, he landed 
at Moidart, on the west coast of Inverness, and called on the 
Jacobite clans to muster and follow him : July 25, 1745. In 
vain their chiefs, headed by Cameron of Lochiel, pointed out 
to him the rash folly of such an enterprise, he persisted, 
and they, letting loyalty get the better of common sense, 
took up the cause and summoned their clansmen. The 
standard of James was raised at Glenfillan, August 19, and 
the commission, naming Charles Rege?it in his stead, was 
read to about a hundred motley but enthusiastic followers. 
Already a small band of them had had a foretaste of victory. 
On their way to the muster they had compelled two companies 
of regular troops, which they had intercepted on their way 
to relieve the garrison of Fort William, to lay down their 
arms. This was followed by a series of successes as un- 
looked for as they were extraordinary. Sir Jehu Cope was sent 
to oppose the rebels with all the troops that the Government 
could raise. But he mismanaged matters, and, instead of 
bringing the enemy to a battle, he let the Highland army, 
which was gathering like a snowball on its way, pass him. 
While he went northward, it came down unopposed upon the 
Lowlands, entered Perth, and advanced towards Edinburgh, 
where James was proclaimed. 

12. Taking of Edinburgh.- The citizens were in the 
greatest alarm when they heard that the Highlanders had 
crossed the Forth. A small band of volunteers and a regi- 
ment of dragoons under Colonel Gardiner marched out to 
meet the rebels as far as Colt Bridge. But when the first 
shots were fired by a small reconnoitring party from the 
Highlanders, they turned and galloped back to Edinburgh. 
This shameful flight was called the Canter of Coltbrigg. 
Charles summoned the city to surrender; the perplexed 
magistrates, not knowing what to do, tried to win time by 
sending repeated messages to Charles. But early the follow- 
M 



178 AFTER THE UNION. [chap. 

ing morning a body of five hundred Camerons under Lochiel 
surprised and entered one of the city gates. They then 
secured the watchmen, opened the other gates, and thus the 
city was in the hands of the rebels. At noon of the same 
day the heralds and pursuivants were obliged to proclaim 
James at the Cross as King James the Eighth, and to read 
his Royal Declaration and the Commission of Regency. 
Charles entered the city the same day, September 17, and 
took up his quarters in the Palace of Holyrood. That night 
all the Jacobites in the city gathered at a ball to celebrate 
his arrival. 

13. Battle of Preston-pans. — Meanwhile CopeYisA brought 
back his troops by sea and landed them at Dunbar. Charles 
marched out from Edinburgh to meet him. At a village 
near Preston-pans, so called from the pans used there for 
crystallizing the sea-salt, the Highlanders defeated the 
regular troops, and came back triumphant to Edinburgh 
with the money and the cannon which they had taken, 
September 20. In this battle Colonel Gardiner was killed 
close to his own park wall. Charles lingered at Edinburgh, 
holding his court at Holyrood, till November 1, when he began 
his march towards England, at the head of an army of five to 
six thousand men. Carlisle surrendered to Charles, who left 
a garrison to defend the castle, and marched on unresisted 
through Preston and Manchester, as far as Dey-by, which he 
reached on December 4. Charles was now two days' march 
nearer London than the army under William Augustus, Duke 
of Cumberland, son of George the Second, which had been 
sent to oppose him. A panic prevailed in London, where the 
citizens expected hourly to see the wild Highlanders enter 
and spoil the city. Their fears were, however, unfounded. 
Jealousies and discord were rife among the rebel chiefs. 
At Derby Charles held a council of war. Some of his 
officers advised one thing, some another. But as they would 



viii.] PRESTON-PANS- FALKIRK— CULL ODEN 1 79 

not agree to march on to London without delay, Charles, 
sorely against his will, was obliged to give the order for 
retreat, and to lead his dispirited followers back again as 
quickly as they had come. Cumberland followed close on 
their rear. At Clifton Moor, near Penrith, there was a 
slight skirmish, in which the rebels had the advantage. Rut 
they did not wait to risk a battle there, but hurried north, 
passing on their way through Dumfries and Glasgow, where 
they levied contributions. 

14. Battle of Falkirk. — When Charles reached Stirling, 
his army was joined by reinforcements which raised its 
number to eight or nine thousand. He prepared to lay 
siege to the Castle. General Hawley was sent from Edin- 
burgh with a nearly equal force to relieve it. The two armie* 
met on Falkirk Afoor, January 17, 1746. Hawley was as 
totally and shamefully beaten as Cope had been at Preston. 
Instead of following up his advantage by pursuing and de- 
stroying the royal army, Charles remained inactive in the 
field, and allowed his followers to plunder the bodies of the 
slain. The next day he went on with the siege of Stirling. 
The Duke of Cumberland was now sent north, with full power 
to put down the rebellion as he pleased. He reached Edin- 
burgh January 30, and the very next day set out at the head 
of an army in quest of the rebels. Charles raised the siege 
of Stirling, and hurried north. He entered Inverness, and 
took Ports George and Augustus, where he found supplies of 
food, guns, and powder, of which his army stood in great 
need. 

15. Battle of Culloden. — Meanwhile the King's troops were 
closing round the rebels, who, cooped up in the barren moun- 
tains, were reduced to the greatest straits. All supplies sent 
from France were cut off before they reached them, and for 
several days they had no food but a little raw oatmeal. It 
was plain that the battle that was unavoidable must be a defeat. 

N 2 



x8o AFTER THE UNION. [chap. 

Culloden Moor was the scene of this the last battle fought on 
British ground. The rebels, who were nearly starving, and 
who had been worn out by a long march and an attempted 
night-attack that had altogether failed, soon gave way, and 
were easily routed by the Duke's well- disciplined and nearly 
twice as numerous army : April 16, 1746. The French auxi- 
liaries fled towards Inverness, where they laid down their 
arms. The rebels lost one thousand men, a fifth of their 
whole number ; the victors only three hundred and ten. 
About twelve hundred of the fugitives rallied at Ruthven ; but 
Charles begged them to disperse, and every man sought his 
own safety as he best might. The after measures of the 
victors were disgraceful to all concerned. No quarter was 
given ; the wounded were slaughtered in cold blood, or burnt 
in the houses to which they had crawled for shelter. For 
three months martial law prevailed ; the country was wasted, 
the houses burnt, the Cattle lifted, the people left to perish. 
It was not till July that the Duke, who in Scotland was called 
the Butcher, went back to London, where he was hailed 
as the deliverer of his country, and rewarded with a pension 
of 25,000/. a year. 

16. Charles's Wanderings. — Charles, whose foolhardy 
ambition had brought all this misery on his simple followers, 
passed five months in perilous wanderings. A great price 
was set on his head ; but, poor as the Highlanders were, 
not one of them would stoop to win it by betraying him. 
At one time, when he was tracked by the soldiers, he was 
saved by a young lady called Flora MacDonald, who got a 
passport for him under the name of Betty Burke, her maid. 
In this disguise he escaped to Skye. After this he came back 
to the mainland, and lived for some time with seven robbers 
in a cave. They kept him hidden and supplied his wants as 
well as they could, and used to go in disguise to the nearest 
town to pick up what news they could. One day, as a great 



vni.] PENALTIES AFTER " FORTY-FIVE." 1S1 

dainty, they brought him back a pennyworth of gingerbread. 
When he left them Charles joined two of his adherents, 
MacPherson of Cluny and Lochiel, and he and they stayed 
in a strange hiding-place called the Cage on the side of 
Ben-alder, till two French vessels appeared on the coast. 
In one of these he embarked, September 20, at Lochnan- 
nagh, the same place where, fourteen months before, he had 
landed. Thus Charles escaped to the Continent, but his 
memory was long cherished in the country that had suffered 
so much for him. He was compelled to leave France after 
the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, and ended an unsettled, dis- 
contented, dissipated life at Rome in 1788. His brother 
Hewy, called the Cardinal of York, the last of the Stewart 
line, survived him nearly twenty years. 

17. Penalties after the " Forty-five."— There was much 
greater severity shown after this rebellion than there had been 
after that in 17 15. The Scottish prisoners were brought for 
trial to England for fear that they might meet with too much 
partiality in their own country. John Murray, of Broughion, 
who had been Charles's secietary, turned informer. Through 
him the secrets of this conspiracy which had been going 
on ever since 1740 were brought to light. Charles Radcliffe, 
brother to the Earl of Derwentwater, who had been be- 
headed in 1 7 16, who had then escaped from prison, was 
retaken on board a French vessel carrying supplies to the 
rebels, and was put to death on his former sentence. The 
Earls of Cromarty and Kilmai'nock and Lord Balmerino were 
brought up for trial before the House of Lords. Cromarty and 
Kilmarnock pleaded guilty ; Balmerino tried to save him- 
self by a quibble about a flaw in the indictment, but this was 
overruled, and they were all three condemned to death. 
Cromarty was pardoned, but Kilmarnock and Balmerino 
were beheaded. Nearly a year after, Simon Eraser, Lord 
Lovat, was brought up for trial ; he was found guilty, chiefly 



1S2 AFTER THE UNION. [chap. 

on the evidence of Murray, was condemned, and beheaded. 
He had acted a double part throughout, for, though he had 
taken part in all the plans of toe rebels, he had taken care not 
to join them in person. Of those lower in rank about eighty 
were condemned to death, and great numbers were sent to 
the plantations. The last sufferer for the Jacobite cause was 
Dr. Cameron, brother of Lochiel. He escaped after 1745, but 
when he returned to England in 1753 he was seized and suf- 
fered death as a traitor, though he protested that he had 
never borne arms against the King, and had been with the 
rebel force only as a surgeon and not as a soldier. An Act 
of Indemnity was at length passed, in 1747, from which, how- 
ever, eighty persons were excepted. Though the end of this 
unjustifiable and unfortunate rebellion was what every one 
must have foreseen, its temporary and unlooked-for success 
showed how necessary it was to take strong measures for 
breaking up the old Highland system. A Bill was passed 
for disarming the clans, and to forbid the wearing of the 
Highland dress, and at the same time heritable jurisdictions 
were done away with . The Episcopal Church, whose attach- 
ment to the Stewarts was well known, suffered severely. The 
Episcopal churches were destroyed, and the ministrations of 
the Episcopal clergy forbidden. Duncan Forbes, of Culloden, 
the President of the Court of Session, though a firm friend of 
the Government, distinguished himself throughout the rebel- 
lion by his efforts in the cause of humanity and justice. 
Before it broke out, he had done more than any other man to 
keep the rising down, and, after it had been crushed, he did 
all in his power to lessen the sufferings of the rebels and 
the severity of the Government. To the discredit of the 
ministry and of the country, his services were left unre- 
warded. 

18. Abolition of Slavery. — In 1756 the lawfulness of negro 
slavery was first questioned in Scotland, and twenty years 



Viii.] TRIALS FOR SEDITION. 183 

later it was settled that negro slavery should exist no longer. 
There were still, however, some natives of the soil who were 
in a state very little better. The colliers and sailers were 
sold like serfs with the works in which they toiled. This 
shameful servitude was not the remains of ancient villanage, 
but had simply arisen out of custom. So strong, however, 
had the force of custom made it, that Parliament did not 
venture at once to sweep it away. It was settled that all the 
colliers and salters born after a certain date should be free, 
and those then at work after a certain term of service. In 
1799 their freedom was established by law. 

19. Attacks on the Romanists. — When the penal laws 
against the Roman Catholics in England were repealed in 
1778, Henry Dundas, the Lord Advocate, proposed a simi 
lar measure for Scotland. On the strength of this, riots broke 
out in Edinburgh and Glasgow. In Edinburgh the mob de- 
stroyed the Roman Catholic chapels and the houses of several 
persons who were suspected of being Romanists. In Glas- 
gow they destroyed a factory belonging to a Romanist. So 
great was the excitement raised throughout the country by 
the fanatics, who bound themselves together in Protestant 
Associations, and the property and persons of the Roman 
Catholics were treated with such violence, that they them- 
selves petitioned that the Bill might be dropped. It was 
not till 1793 that a Bill was brought in and passed without 
opposition to relieve the Roman Catholics in Scotland from 
the penalties to which they were liable on account of their 
religious opinions. 

20. Trials for Sedition. — The excesses of the French 
Revolution led to a reaction of feeling in Great Britain 
against all liberal opinions, as being likely to bring about 
a similar revolution in this country. This led to much injus- 
tice and oppression. Persons were charged with stirring up 
sedition on the slightest grounds, or on no grounds at all ; were 



184 AFTER THE UNION. [chap. 



found guilty, and punished on the most scanty evidence. In 
Scotland the panic was even greater than in England, and 
the proceedings of justice more unjust. In 1793 Thomas 
Muir,2Xi advocate, and Fy she Palmer, a clergyman, were tried, 
and sentenced to transportation, the one for fourteen years, 
the other for seven, for no other crime than that of discussing 
Parliamentary Reforin. Others suffered a like fate ; and 
though these cases were brought before the House of Com- 
mons, and though the sympathy of the people was with them, 
they met with no redress. Braxfield, the Lord Justice Clerk, 
gained an infamous notoriety by his violent language to- 
wards the prisoners, and by the illegal sentences which he 
passed against them. 

21. Reform Bill.— It was not till nearly forty years had 
passed, that the reforms, for suggesting which these men had 
suffered, and the need of which had long been felt, were at 
last carried out by the passing of the Refo7-m Bill in 1832. By 
it the entire representation was remodelled. Up to this time 
the County franchise had depended not on the possession of 
land, but on the right of superiority over land which might be 
held by others. This right could be bought and sold, and was 
quite independent of property or residence in the county, so 
that in most cases there were but a handful of electors, in one 
county only one, to return the member. The franchise was 
now extended to all persons having property in the county to 
the value of 10/. yearly, and to certain classes of leaseholders. 
The case of the Burghs was even worse. Only the royal 
burghs were represented at all, and these were grouped toge- 
ther and returned one member only for each group. This 
member was elected by delegates chosen from the Town 
Council of each burgh, so that the election was really and 
truly in the hands of the Corporations. By the new Bill, Edin- 
burgh and Glasgow were each to send two members to Par- 
liament, the five towns next in importance were each to send 



viii.] RELIGIOUS SECTS. 185 

one, while some changes were made in the grouping of the 
smaller burghs. The members for the burghs were to be 
elected by householders in the burghs paying 10/. yearly 
rent. The number of members was increased from forty- 
five to fifty-three. 

22. Religious Sects. — When the Presbyterian polity was 
re-established by law in 1690 the Episcopalians took in some 
degree the place which had been held by the Covenanters. 
As they would not acknowledge William and Mary as law- 
ful sovereigns, they were looked on as a dangerous and ob- 
stinate sect of dissenters, just as the Cameronians had been 
considered in the reign of James. They had been turned 
out of the churches, but they were forbidden to have private 
meeting-houses. In Queen Anntfs reign an Act of Toleration 
was passed to protect such of them as would use the English 
Liturgy and pray for the Queen in the course of the 
service. After the Rebellion of 17 15 new laws were passed 
against them ; the validity of orders from Scottish bishops 
was called in question, and the ministration of all clergymen 
who were not licensed was forbidden. After the Rebellion of 
1745 they fared still worse; many of their meeting-houses 
were burned or dismantled by Cumberland's soldiers. An 
Act was passed forbidding any clergyman to read the service 
to more than five persons at once, and no letters of orders 
were considered valid unless given by some Irish or English 
bishop. In 1755 a clergyman named Connacher was accused 
of illegally celebrating marriages, and, by an Act passed 
against the Covenanters in the reign of Charles the Second, 
he was banished, and forbidden to return on pain of death. 
Hence it came to pass that, just after the two kingdoms were 
politically united, they were more widely severed in religious 
opinion than they had ever been before, so that a conscien- 
tious member of the Church established by law in the one 
kingdom would have been looked on as a dangerous dis- 



1S6 AFTER THE UNION. [chap. 

senter in the other. It was not till 1792 that 'an Act was 
passed relieving the Episcopalians from the penal laws 
in force against them. In 1784 Dr. Samuel Seabury, from 
Connecticut, was consecrated by three Scottish bishops, 
Pctrie, Skinner, and Kilgour the primus, at Aberdeen, so that 
the Episcopal Church of America is an offshoot from the 
once proscribed and persecuted Episcopal Church in Scot- 
land. Besides the Episcopalians there were many sects of 
Presbyterians who seceded from the Establishment chiefly 
on the question of patronage. At last, in 1843, the Church 
of Scotland split into two parties. This is called the Disrup- 
tion. About ten years before this time Edward Irving, 
Minister of the Scotch Church in London, a very eloquent 
preacher, was forced to secede from the Presbyterian Church 
for holding extravagant views with regard to the power of 
speaking in unknown tongues and working miracles. His 
followers founded a new sect, which has since won many 
adherents in both kingdoms. In its rites and ceremonies it 
now resembles much more nearly the Roman than the 
Presbyterian Church. 

23. The Disruption. — This division was brought about by 
a dispute about the right of patrons to force ministers on 
parishes, whether the congregations objected to them or not. 
The spirit of the Presbyterian Church had always been op- 
posed to patronage. By the First Book of Discipline it had 
been laid down that the people should elect their own minis- 
ters ; by the Second Book of Discipline, that they should at 
least have the right of objecting to any chosen for them by the 
heritors or landowners in the parish. After the Revolution, 
an Act of 1690 confirmed them in this privilege, but after the 
Union in 17 12 the heritors, eager to regain what they thought 
their rights, obtained a repeal of this Act and the restora- 
tion of their former powers. In spite of the protests of the 
people and of the Church, this Act gradually became custom 



VIII.] THE DISRUPTION. 187 

as well as law, and led to several schisms; for those congrega- 
tions who did not choose to have ministers forced on them 
whom they did not approve, broke off, and founded separate 
sects. At length, in 1834, the Non-intrusion party, as those 
who were opposed to patronage were called, had a majority 
in the Assembly, and passed the Veto Act. This Act de- 
clared it to be " a fundamental law of the Church that no 
pastor shall be intruded on a congregation contrary to the 
will of the people," and that, if the heads of families object to 
any candidate presented by the patron, the Presbytery shall 
reject him. In the same year, Mr. Young was presented to 
the parish of Auchterarder^ in Perthshire. Several persons 
objected to him, and the Presbytery, acting on the Veto 
Act, rejected him. The patron, Lord Kimwul, appealed to 
the Court of Session for the enforcement of his civil rights 
and obtained a verdict in his favour ; but the Presbytery 
appealed to the House of Lords. Here too it was given 
against them, but they still refused to make trial of Mr. 
Young. In another parish, Strathbogie, the presentee, Mr. 
Edwards, was objected to by the congregation, and the 
Presbytery refused to admit him to the parish. He also 
obtained a decree in his favour from the Court of Session, 
when the Presbytery yielded, and for this they were sus- 
pended and deposed by the General Assembly. From this 
it was clear that the majority in the Assembly were 
determined to go all lengths in resisting the civil power. 
In the end the Church had to yield, and to recall the 
illegal Veto Act. Rather than agree to this, in 1843, 
more than a third of the clergy left the Church. Their 
leaders were Dr. Chalmers and Dr. Candlish. Great 
numbers of the people went " out/' as it was called, with 
their ministers, and the Free Church which was thus 
originated has ever since been the successful rival of the 
Establishment. 



1 88 AFTER THE UNION. [chap. 

24. Social Progress. — The removal of the Government to 
London attracted thither not only all the Scottish nobles, 
but also all the wealthy and the ambitious commoners. 
Thus Edinburgh lost much of its importance through the 
Union, though it still remained the intellectual capital, where 
the members of the Courts of Law and of the University took 
the lead in society. Meanwhile Glasgow, the capital of the 
west, where the manufactures which were first introduced by 
Duncan Forbes had taken firm root, gradually rose to much 
greater importance in wealth and commerce. During this 
period two great elements of civilization, productive industry 
and intellectual culture, have done much to improve the 
Lowland population, among whom book-learning has always 
been in advance of material comfort. It was not till after the 
Rebellion of 1745 that the spirit of industry first began to 
animate the people. But the Highlands remained for some 
time in a very bad state. The spirit of the people was 
broken, and the severe climate, barren soil, and lack of 
minerals left them no resource but the fisheries. The 
Highland Society, founded in 1784, did much to improve 
the state of agriculture, by reclaiming the waste districts; 
and latterly great numbers of the people have emigrated. 
At the time of the Union Scotland was without agriculture, 
manufactures, or trade ; since then she has risen to excellence 
in them all, and has produced some of the most useful inven- 
tions of modern times. James Watt, who perfected the inven- 
tion of the steam-engine, and thus placed a new power in the 
hands of man, was born at Greenock in 1736. It was in Scot- 
land that this power was first put to use for traffic by steam 
navigation. A small pleasure-boat, worked by a steam- 
engine, was tried on Dalswinton Loch in Dumfriesshire in 
1788 ; another effort was made on the Forth and Clyde Canal 
in 1 802 ; but the first steamboat actually used for traffic was 
the Comet, which began to ply on the Clyde in 181 2. It was 



Viii.] SOCIAL PROGRESS. 189 

projected by Henry Bell, a house-carpenter in Glasgow. 
Many improvements in calico-printing and dyeing, and in all 
sorts of machinery, are likewise due to Scotchmen. Among 
others Macadam is noteworthy for originating that system of 
road-making which is now known by his name. 

25. Literature and Art. — After the Union, the English 
dialect of the Lowlands ceased to be the language of literature 
and of the upper ranks in society. Thus the national literature 
of the country came to an end, and the works of Scotchmen 
went to swell the mass of English Literature. But even in this 
period Scotland has had, besides many smaller songsters, 
two poets peculiarly her own, who have sung in the dialect 
still spoken by the people. Allan Ramsay, born in Clydes- 
dale in 1685, began life as a barber's boy in Edinburgh ; he 
then turned poet and bookseller, and besides his own poems, 
which were very popular, he collected and published the 
songs and ballads of the forgotten bards of earlier days. 
Nearly a century later lived Robert Burns, the peasant poet, 
a cotter's son, born in Ayrshire in 1759. His genius overcame 
the disadvantages of his humble birth, and inspired innumer- 
able songs, which place him in the first rank among poets of 
all nations, and will win for him an abiding place in the hearts 
of his fellow-countrymen as long as a Scottish tongue is left 
to sing them. Adam Smith, who by his " Wealth of Nations," 
published in 1776, may be said to have founded the science 
of Political Economy, was born at Kirkaldy, and was Profes- 
sor of Moral Philosophy in the University of Glasgow ; and 
about the same time Dr. Robertson, Principal of the Univer- 
sity of Edinburgh, wrote several historical works of great 
merit. David Hume, the infidel philosopher, was born at 
Edinburgh in 17 11. He is best known as the author of a 
popular but untrustworthy History of England. Tobias 
Smollett, the humourist, was a native of Cardross. Besides 
several very clever novels, the best of which are " Humphrey 



190 AFTER THE UNION. [chap, 

Clinker "and " Roderick Random," he wrote a complete His- 
tory of England from the first historical mention of Britain 
down to the year 1768. The latter part of this history is 
now generally added to the History by Hume, who did not 
carry his work down to later times than the Revolution. 
Hugh Blair, a Presbyterian divine, wrote " Lectures on 
Belles Lettres " and several volumes of sermons which are 
still highly esteemed. Dngald Stewart, Professor of Moral 
Philosophy in the University of Edinburgh, was distinguished 
as a scholar and philosopher. His chief works are the 
" Philosophy of the Human Mind" and " Outlines of Moral 
Philosophy." Among Scottish artists who rose to eminence 
during this period are Allan Ramsay, the son of the poet, 
Runciman, Raeburn and Sir David Wilkie, born in Fifeshire 
in 1785. He chiefly excelled in painting scenes from rural 
life, and was limner to the King for Scotland. Of poets 
who wrote in the English of the south, Scotland can lay 
claim to James Thomson, the author of "The Seasons," "The 
Castle of Indolence," and some tragedies ; to Beattie, the 
author of " The Minstrel ; " and to Thomas Campbell, born 
at Glasgow in 1777. His imaginative poem, " The Pleasures 
of Hope," laid the foundation of his fame. It is written in a 
graceful and highly-finished style, but is far surpassed in 
originality and spirit by the ballads which he wrote to com- 
memorate the " Battle of the Baltic " and the other actions 
of the French war. John Gait deserves to be remembered 
as the author of some clever novels, the best of which are the 
" Ayrshire Legatees " and " The Entail." Nearer to our 
own time Walter Scott, the poet and romancist, gave to Eng- 
lish literature its best works of fiction, and at once intro- 
duced and perfected the modern novel. Among writers of 
fiction Miss Ferrier must not be forgotten. In her witty, 
satirical novels, " Marriage," " Destiny," "The Inheritance," 
she has left admirable pictures of Scottish life and manners. 



SUMMARY. 



191 



John Lockhart, the son-in-law and biographer of Scott ; 
John Wilson, Professor of Moral Philosophy in Edinburgh, 
the Christopher North of the " Noctes Ambrosianae ; " his 
friend and contemporary James Hogg, the poet, better 
known as the " Ettrick Shepherd ;" the two Alisons, father 
and son, the elder the author of the " Essay on Taste," the 
younger of the " History of Europe," may all be reckoned 
among Scotchmen who have done honour to their country 
by their literary labours. In the world of science Scotland 
has been represented by James Ferguson, the astronomer, 
Hugh Miller, the great geologist, who began life as a stone- 
mason ; Sir David Brewster, who is famous for his dis- 
coveries in optics, and many others. Mungo Park, the 
African explorer of a past day, and Dr. Livingstone, who 
in our own time has worked so long in the same field of 
discovery, were both also born in Scotland. But now that 
the two nations have become so closely united, national 
jealousy and national pride are both alike well-nigh for- 
gotten, and Scotchmen are content to throw their energy 
and talents at home and in the colonies into the common 
stock of British glory. 

26. Summary. — The separate History of Scotland, which 
may be said to have ceased with the Union, is chiefly re- 
markable from its unconnected and fragmentary character. 
Each of the periods into which it is naturally divided breaks 
off abruptly, and exercises little or no influence on the period 
which comes after it. The Celtic system comes to an end 
with the last of, the Gaelic kings. During the English 
period English laws and English customs are introduced, 
but this English influence is suddenly checked by the War 
of Independence, and the period which begins with the inde- 
pendent kingdom is no more the natural result of the second 
than the second is of the first. During the third period the 
Roman Law is introduced, and France takes the place of 



192 AFTER THE UNION. [chap. 

England as the model for imitation. The Scottish system 
of representation, which became fixed during this period, 
had much more in common with the French National As- 
sembly than with the English Parliament. The Three 
Estates, which met in one chamber, were the Church, the 
barons, that is the tenants holding direct from the Crown, 
and the burghers. The Commons as a class were not re- 
presented at all. It is the Reformation which first brings 
the Commons into notice. The feudal character of the legis- 
lature and of the national representation drove the energies 
of the people into the only channel that was left open to them 
— that of religious thought. Hence it came that in Scotland 
the great struggle for political freedom was fought out under 
the cloak of a contest for liberty of conscience. From the 
Reformation to the Union the history of the country is little 
but the record of a series of religious wars. The history of Scot- 
land also gives us a picture of pure and unmixed feudalism, 
The feudal system which' was introduced under the sons of 
Malcolm and Margaret took much firmer root in Scotland 
than it ever did in England : and, as it was here untouched 
by the Common Law and the growth of the constitution 
which acted as checks upon it in England, it grew to such an 
excess of power that it quite overshadowed the power of the 
Crown. The practice of making hereditary jurisdictions, 
and of granting powers of regality, still further increased the 
influence of the feudal nobles. Feudalism existed in Scot- 
land long after it had been overthrown in England. Its 
power was first broken by the Act which was passed in 1748 
for abolishing heritable jurisdictions, and even after that 
Act it continued to influence the representation. Feudalism 
in Scotland was not finally overthrown till the passing of the 
first Reform Bill in 1832. Nor was it till after that reform 
that the Commons of Scotland were represented at all in 
Parliament. The rebelions in favour of the Stewarts in 17 15 



vni.] CONCLUSION. 193 

and 1745, though they were the cause of much useless blood- 
shed, led to very happy results as far as the social pro- 
sperity of the country was concerned. The abolition of 
the heritable jurisdictions did much good, for it placed 
agriculturists in a much freer position, while the money 
which was paid to the great proprietors as a compensa- 
tion for their feudal rights gave a fresh spring to the 
circulation of the country. At the time of the Union 
Scotland was without agriculture, manufactures, shipping, 
or commerce. Since then she has risen to excellence in 
them all. 



INDEX. 



A. 



Abjuration Oath, 151. _ 
Agricola, Julius, invasion of, 4. 
Aidan founds Lindisfarne, 9. 
Albany, Robert, Duke of, 61 ; his 

regency, 63 ; his death, 66. 
Alexander I., 20 ; defeats the men of 

Moray, ib. ; defends the liberty of 

the Church, 21 ; 
Alexander II., invades England, 29; 

his marriage, 30 ; his death, 31. 
Alexander III., his coronation, 31 ; 

his death, 32. 
Ancrum, rout of the English at, 90. 
Angus, Archibald, Earl of (Bell the 

Cat), 78. 
Anne, 161 ; her death, 168. 
Arbroath Abbey founded, 29. 
Argyle, Archibald, Earl of, refuses to 

take the Test, 151 ; his rising, ib. ', 

is beheaded, 152. 
Argyle, Archibald, Marquess of, his 

government, 138 ; crowns Charles 

II., 141 ; is beheaded, 144. 
Arkinholm, battle of, 74. 
Armstrong, John, his hanging, 87. 
Arran, James Hamilton, Earl of, 81 ; 

his power, 83 ; his regency, 89. 
Arran, Ochiltree, created Earl of, 115. 
Auchterarder, case of, 187. 



B. 



Baillie, of Jerviswood, his death, 151. 

Balliol, Edward, his invasion, 57. 

Ballio' John, his claim to the throne, 
36 : his coronation, 39 ; his alliance 
with France, ib. ; his submission to 
Edward, 41. » 

Balmerinoch, John Elphinstone, Lord, 
his imprisonment, 130. 

Bannockburn, battle of, 50. 

Barbour, John, Archdeacon of Aber- 
deen, biographer of Bruce, 48. 



Barton, Andrew, his death, 81. 
Bass Castle holds out for James, 158. 
Beaton, Cardinal David, his murder 

92. 
Beaton, James, Archbishop of St. 

Andrews, his conscience, 84. 
Beauge, battle of, 65. 
Beck, Anthony, his flight, 42. 
Bell, Henry, his steamboat, 188. 
Berwick, importance of, 34 ; siege of, 

40 ; treaty of, 100. 
Blackadder, Robert, first Archbishop 

of Glasgow, 82 
Blanks, Spanish, 119. 
Boece, Hector, his fabulous history, 94. 
Bothwell, Adam, Bishop of Orkney, 

106. 
Bothwell Bridge, battle of, 150. 
Bothwell, James Hepburn, Earl of, 

104 ; marries Queen Mary, 105 ; his 

flight, 106. 
Boyd, Thomas, created Earl of Arran, 

76. 
Boyds, power of, 76. 
Brechin, bell-tower of, 18. 
Brigham, treaty of, 36. 
Brown, John, story of, 152. 
Bruce, grant of Annandale to, 36. 
Bruce, Robert, one of the claimants of 

the crown, 36. 
Bruce, Robert, Earl of Carrick, his 

coronation, 47 ; his reverses, 48 ; his 

victory at Bannockburn, 50 ; his 

comrades, 51 ; his parliaments, 55 ; 

his death, 56. 
Brunanburh, battle of, 12. 
Bunby, tutor of, Laird of, slain by 

Douglas, 73. 
Buchan, Alexander, Earl of, Wolf of 

Badenoch, 62. 
Buchan, Countess of, crowns Bruce, 

47 ; caged by Edward, ib. 
Buchan, Herrying of, 49. 
Buchan, John Stewart, Earl of, 65. 
Buchanan, George, his works, 124. 
Burns, Robert, the poet, 189. 



196 



INDEX. 



Cambuskennefh, Parliament of, 55. 

Cameron, Richard, leader of the 
Cameronians, 149. 

Candlemas, burnt, 59. 

Carberry, surrender at, 106. 

Carham, battle of, 12. . 

Casket letters. 107, 109. 

Chapman, Walter, sets up first print- 
ing press, 83. 

Charles Edward Stuart (the Young 
Pretender), his landing, 176; his 
Court at Edinburgh, 177 ; his inva- 
sion of England, 178 ; his perils, 
180. 

Charles I., his resumption of Benefices, 
129 ; his visit to Scotland, 130 ; his 
double dealing, 132 ; his appeal to 
the Scots, 137 ; his treaty with the 
Engagers, 138 ; his death, 139. 

Charles II., proclamation of, 139; his 
arrival in Scotland, 140 ; his corona- 
tion, 141 ; his defeat at Worcester, 
ib. ; his restoration, 143 ; his mis- 
government, 144 — 151 ; his death, 

Charles XII. of Sweden, his project of 

invasion, 173. 
Claverhouse, James Graham of, beaten 

at Drumclog, 149; his revolt, 155 ; 

is beaten at Killiecrankie, 157. 
Cnut, invasion of, 13. 
Colliers and salters, slavery of, 183. 
Cope, Sir John, his flight, 177. 
Coltbrigg, canter of, 177. 
Columba, comes from Ireland, 6; 

founds Iona, 7 ; converts Picts, ib. 
Committee of Articles, its origin, 69. 
Common Order, Book of, 114. 
Comyn, John, the Red, his murder, 46. 
Constantine I., his reign, 10. 
Constantine II., commendation of, 11. 
Constantine III., reign of, 12. 
Conventicles, 146 ; laws against, 148. 
Court ©f Session, founding of, 88. 
Covenant, first, 98 ; renewals of, 119, 

132. 
Culloden Moor, battle of, 179. 
Cumberland, William Augustus, Duke 

of (the Butcher), victor at Culloden, 

180. 



Dairiada founded, 6. 
Darien scheme, 159. 
Darnley, Henry Stewart, Lord, 102; 
his murder, 105. 



David I., Prince of Strathclyde, 20; 

encourages Normans, 22 ; invades 

England, ib. ; character of, 25. 
David II., first anointed King of 

Scots, 56 ; taken prisoner, 58. 
Discipline, books of, 101, 118. 
Disruption, causes of, 186. 
Donald I., King of Scots, 10. 
Donald Bane seizes the throne, 17. 
Donald, Dhu, last Lord of the Isles, 

81. 
Douglas, Archibald, Earl of (Tine- 
man), slain at Verneuil, 66. 
Douglas, Earl of, slain at Otterburn, 

61. 
Douglas, Gavin, Bishop of Dunkeld, 

84; his poems, 95. 
Douglas, James of, his larder, 51 ; his 

raids into England, 53 ; his death, 

56. 
Douglas, James, Earl of, defeated at 

Arkinholm, 74. 
Douglas, William, Earl of, beheaded, 

Douglas, William, Earl of, his murder, 

Drumclog, Conventicle at, 149. 
Drummond of Hawthornden, his 

poems, 165. 
Drummond, James, Earl of Perth, 

153- 

Drunken Parliament, 145. 

Dunbar, William, his poems, 95. 

Dunbarton, taking of, in. 

Dunoan I., death of, 13. 

Dunfermline Church founded by Mar- 
garet, 17. 

Dunkeld, attack on, 157. 

Dunnottar, regalia sent to, 142 ; Cove- 
nanters imprisoned in, 153. 

Duplin, battle of, 57. 



Eadgar, reign of, 19. 
Eadgar the iEtheling, comes to Scot- 
land, 14 ; overthrows Donald Bane, 

x 7- 

Eadmer, Bishop of St. Andrews, 21. 

Eadmund joins Donald Bane, 17. 

Education Act, passing of, 161. 

Edward I., holds a Council at Nor- 
ham, 37 ; first conquest of Scotland, 
40 ; second conquest, 44 ; attempts 
to unite Scotland to England, 45 ; 
his death, 47. 

Edward II., his invasion of Scotland, 
49 ; his defeat and flight, 50. 



INDEX. 



97 



Edward III., his invasion of Scotland, 

Ejection, 145. 

Elphinstone.Bishop, founds University 
at Aberdeen, 83. 



F. 



Falaise, convention of, 27. 

Falkirk, battle of, 44. 

Falkirk Moor, battle of, 179. 

Flodden, battle of, 81. 

Forbes, Duncan, of Culloden, his phil- 
anthropy, 182. 

Fordun, John of, writes Scotichro- 
nicon, 66. 

Forster, Thomas, his rebellion, 170. 

Fort William, building of, 158. 

" Forty-five," rebellion of, 175. 



G. 



Galloway, final subjection of, 28. 

George I., 168. 

Glasgow, founding of University at, 75. 

Glencoe, massacre of, 158. 

Glen Fruin, battle at, 127. 

Glenfillan, standard of rebellion raised 

at, 177. 
Glenlivat, battle of, 120. 
Gordon, rise of the House of, 74. 
Gowrie Plot, 120. 

Grahame Malise, his conspiracy, 69. 
Grange, William Kirkcaldy of, 106; 

declares for the Queen, in; his 

death, 114. 
Gray, Sir Patrick, wrath of, 73. 
Green, Captain, trial of, 162. 
Grig seizes the throne, 11. 
Gruach, her claims to the throne, 13. 
Guthrie, James, his fate, 144. 



H. 



Hadrian, wall of, 4. 
Halidon Hill, battle of, 58. 
Hamilton, James, of Bothwellhaugh, 

murderer of the Regent, no. 
Hamilton, Marquess of, Commissioner, 

132; his invasion of England, 138 ; 

his death, 139. 
Harlaw, battle of, 65. 
Hawley, General, his defeat, 179. 
Henry, son of David I., death of, 94 ; 

his children, 25. 
Hertford, Edward Seymour, Earl of, 

his invasions, 90, 91. 



Ida founds Northumberland, 6. 
Indulgence, the passing of, 153. 
Intercommuning, law against, 14 
Inverness, its importance, 35. 
Irvine, surrender at, 42.^ 
Irving, Edward, his schism, 186. 



J- 



James I., his capture, 63 ; his return, 
67 ; his treatment of the chiefs, 68 ; 
his murder, 69 ; his judicial reforms, 
ib. ; his poems, 70. 

James II., his accession, 71 ; murders 
Douglas, 74 ; his death, 75. 

Tames III., 75 ; his marriage, 76; his 
favourites, 78 ; his death, 79. 

James IV., 79; his marriage, 80; his 
fleet, 81 ; his alliance with France, 
ib. ; his invasion of England, 82 ; 
his character and death, ib. 

James V., 83; his erection, 85; war 
with England, 87 ; his death, 88 : his 
judicial reforms, ib. ; his poems, 89. 

James VI., his coronation, 107 ; his 
favourites, 115 ; his imprisonment at 
Ruthven, 116; his marriage, 117; 
his contest with the ministers, 120 ; 
his accession to England, 122 ; his 
restoration of episcopacy, 126 ; his 
visit to Scotland, 127 ; his death, 
128. 

James VII., his conduct as Duke of 
York, 150 ; his persecutions, 151 ; 
his deposition, 153. 

James Stuart, Chevalier de St. 
George, Old Pretender, 168; his 
rebellion, 169 ; his landing in Scot- 
land, 172. 

Jameson, George, noted painter, 165. 

Jedburgh, destruction of, 64. 

John of Bretayne, Lieutenant of Scot- 
land, 45. 



Kentigern, Apostle of Strathclyde, 8. 
Killiecrankie, battle of, 157. 
Kilsyth, battle of, 337. 
Knox, John, first mention of, 92 ; leader 

of the Reformers, 99 ; his death and 

character, 113. 



198 



INDEX. 



Langside, battle of, 108. 

Lennox, Matthew Stewart, Earl of, 
his marriage, 90 ; his regency, 1 1 1 ; 
his death, 112. 

Leslie, David, leader of the Cove- 
nanters, 137. 

Lethington, William Maitland of, 109 ; 
his death, 115. 

Liturgy tumults, 131. 

Lorn, John Macdougal of, Bruce's 
enemy, 48. 

Lulach, son of Gruach, 14. 

Lyndesay, Sir David, his poems, 95. 



M. 

MacAlpin, Kenneth, first King of Picts 
and Scots, 9. 

Macbeth, reign of, 13. 

Macduff, appeal of, to Edward I., 39. 

Maclauchlan, Margaret, death of, 152. 

Malcolm I. obtains grant of Strath- 
clyde, 12. 

Malcolm II. gets Lothian, 13. 

Malcolm III., Canmore, marries Mar- 
garet, 15 ; meeting with William, ib.\ 
raids into England, ib., 16; death 
of, 16. 

Malcolm IV. subdues Galloway, 26 ; 
meets Henry at Chester, 27. 

Malt-tax riots, 174. 

Mar, Alexander Stewart, Earl of, de- 
feats the Highlanders at Harlaw, 64. 

Mar, John Erskine, Earl of, Regent, 
"3 

Mar, John, Earl of (Bobbing John), 
his rebellion, 169. 

Margaret, the Maid of Norway, her 
death, 36. 

Margaret, St., her reforms, 16. 

Mary, Princess of Orange, 154. 

Mary Stewart, her birth, 88 ; her 
removal to France, 91 ; her first 
marriage, 92 ; her return to Scot- 
land, 100 ; her second marriage, 
102 ; her favourites, 103 ; her flight 
to Dunbar, 104 ; her third marriage, 
105 ; her surrender, 106 ; her escape 
from Loch Leven, 107; her flight 
into England, 109; her death, 117. 

Matilda, daughter of Malcolm, marries 
Henry of England, 20. 

Middleton, Eariof, Commissioner, 143. 

Mile Act, the, 145. 

Milton, chapter of, 53. 



Mitchell, his attempt on the life of 

Sharp, 148. 
Moidart, landing of the young Cheva- 
lier at, 177. 
Monk, General, his reduction of Scot 

land, 141 ; his share in the Restora 

tion, 143. 
Montrose, James Graham, Earl of, 

takes up arms for the Covenant, 
' 133 ; joins the King, 136; his rising 

for Charles II., 140 ; his death, ib. 
Moray, extent of, 10. 
Mormaers, their office, 9. 
Morton, James Douglas, Earl of, his 

regency, 115. 
Murray. James Stewart, Earl of, 102 ; 

his regency, 107 ; his murder, no. 

N. 

Napier, of Merchiston, his writings, 

166. 
Nectansmere, battle of, 9. 
Neville's Cross, battle of, 58. 
Norham, Council at, 37. 
Northampton, Council at, 28 ; peace 

of, 54- 
Northmen, first coming of, 10 ; settle 

in the Sudereys, n ; invasion of 

under Magnus, 19 ; last invasion of, 

O. 

Olifant, Sir William, defender of Stir- 
ling Castle, 44. 
Otterburn, raid of, 60. 



P. 



Penrith, skirmish at, 171. 

Perth, Clan battle at, 62 ; murdei of 

James at, 69 ; Articles of, 127. 
Philiphaugh, battle of, 137. 
Picts united to Scots, 9. 
Pinkie, battle of, 91. 
Porteous riots, 174. 
Preston, battle at, 171. 
Preston-pans, battle of, 178. 



Quakers, indulgence to, 153. 



Rabbling, 154. 

Ramsay. Allan, his poems, 89. 
Ramsay, Allan, the painter, 18c 
Randolf, Earl of, of Moray, 53. 



INDEX. 



199 



Reform Bill, passing of, 184. 
Reformation, causes of, 97 ; statutes 

passed, 100 ; results of, 123. 
Regalia, story of, 142. 
Reseby, John, burning of, 66. 
Rizzio, murder of, 103. 
Robert I , see Bruce. 
Robert II., his marriages, 59 ; his 

death, 61. 
Robert III., his change of name, 61; 

his imbecility, 61 ; his death, 63. 
Rothesay, David, first Duke of, 61. 
Roxburgh, siege of, 75. 
Ruthven, Lord, his share in the 

murder of Rizzio, 103. 
Ruthven, raid of, 116. 



Tables, choosing of, 131. 
Test Act, passing of, 150. 
Theodosius makes Valentia a Roman 

province, 5. 
Thomas, the Rhymer, his predictions, 

32. 
Tippermuir, battle of, 136. 
Toleration, Act of, 185. 
Touraine granted to Douglas, 65. 
Treasurer, first appointment of, 70. 
Tudor, Margaret, marries James IV., 

80. 
Tulchan Bishops, 113. 
Turriff, Trot of, 133. 



S. 

St. Andrews, founding of University 
at, 66. 

Sanquhar, Declaration of, 149. 

Sauchieburn, battle of, 79. 

Scotia, Neva, founding of, 128. 

Scott, Sir Walter, 190. 

Scots, first coming of, 6. 

Seabury, Dr. Samuel, his consecration, 
186. 

Sedition, trials for, 183. 

Severus, invasion of, 5. 

Sharp, James, Archbishop of St. An- 
drew , his consecration, 144 ; murder 
of, 148. _ 

Sheriffmuir, battle at, 171. 

Siward defeats Macbeth, 14. 

Slavery, abolition of, 183. 

Smith, Adam, his "Wealth of Nations," 
189. 

Smollett, Tobias, the novelist, 189. 

Solway, Moss, defeated at, 87. 

Spider, Bruce's, 48. 

Standard, battle of, 23. 

Stewart, origin of the name, 59. 

Stirling, battle of, 43. 

Stirling, Earl of, founder of Nova 
Scotia, 128. 

Supplication, Great, 131. 



U. 

Union, 163 ; results of, 164 ; discontent 

with, 167. 
Uttoxeter, surrender at, 138. 



V. 

Verneuil, battle of, 65. 
Veto Act, passing of, 187. 



W. 

Wallace, William, his rising, 42 ; his 
victory at Stirling, 43 ; his defeat at 
Falkirk, 44 ; his military geuius, ib. ; 
his betrayal and death, 45. 

Warbeck, Perkin, his reception in 
Scotland, 80. 

Watt, James, his inventions. 188. 

Whiggamores' Raid, the, 138. 

William of Orange, 154: his reduction 
of the Highlands, 158 ; his death, 
161. 

William the Lion, his capture, 27. 

Wilson, Margaret, death of, 152. 

Wyntoun, Andrew, his chronicle, 66. 



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